| Time | Speaker | Text |
|---|---|---|
| 00:00:07.74 | Heidi Scoble | Streaming's up. Good evening, Mayor Hoffman and council members. This meeting is being held pursuant to section three, the executive order N-29-20 issued by Governor Newsom on March 17th, 2020. And all members are joining this meeting telephonically And it's being broadcast live on the city's website and on cable TV channel 27. |
| 00:00:27.88 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you Madam Clerk, good evening and welcome to the regular City Council's meeting for Tuesday, April 13th, 2021. We will begin in closed session at 6 p.m. shortly. Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll? Council member Sobieski. |
| 00:00:50.44 | Jill Hoffman | Councilmember Sobieski, you might be on mute. |
| 00:00:52.11 | Ian Sobieski | I am here. |
| 00:00:54.71 | Jill Hoffman | Councilman? |
| 00:00:55.03 | Heidi Scoble | and we're blasting. |
| 00:00:56.44 | Jill Hoffman | Here. |
| 00:00:56.63 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Councilmember Cleveland Knowles. |
| 00:00:59.53 | Jill Hoffman | here. |
| 00:01:00.55 | Heidi Scoble | Vice Mayor Kellman. |
| 00:01:01.88 | Jill Hoffman | THE FAMILY. |
| 00:01:02.72 | Heidi Scoble | Mayor Hoffman. |
| 00:01:04.21 | Jill Hoffman | Here. All members are present and we have a quorum. Items D1 and D2 will be discussed in closed session. Item D1 is public employment pursuant to Um, CGC section 54957 title city manager and D2 is public employee performance evaluation pursuant to. section. CGC section 54957 title interim city manager At this point, I will open public comment on this item Now, I don't want to. Do we have any problems? |
| 00:01:41.03 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 00:01:41.97 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:01:41.99 | Heidi Scoble | on the on the meeting. Madam Mayor, we do not have any participants that have joined this meeting. Okay, very good, thank you. |
| 00:01:50.97 | Jill Hoffman | I will close public comment and I will close Thank you. We will now move to a closed session. So thank you. And we'll see you back at 7 o'clock to start our open session. |
| 00:02:10.88 | Unknown | my whole disposition. A little taste might break the ice |
| 00:02:14.79 | Bradley O'Brien | Thank you. Great. |
| 00:02:18.37 | Unknown | And make the nasty seem like nice |
| 00:02:20.09 | Bradley O'Brien | Thank you. you |
| 00:02:22.47 | Unknown | One little taste. |
| 00:02:33.10 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, you may begin the meeting. you |
| 00:02:35.74 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:02:35.94 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 00:02:35.97 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:02:36.14 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. I'm sorry. |
| 00:02:36.88 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:02:36.90 | Heidi Scoble | I'm not sure. |
| 00:02:38.64 | Jill Hoffman | Madam Clerk do you need to read the Um, because it's, we're going back into open session or is that done because we already did open session. |
| 00:02:47.70 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, it's done because we did the announcement at the beginning of the meeting in a session. |
| 00:02:52.09 | Jill Hoffman | I know. Okay, very good, thank you. Okay, good evening and welcome to the regular Sausalito City Council meeting for April 13, 2021. Um, Madam, could you Please call the roll. |
| 00:03:06.62 | Heidi Scoble | Councilmember Sobieski? |
| 00:03:08.22 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 00:03:08.24 | Heidi Scoble | YOU'RE ABLE TO DO THAT. |
| 00:03:08.51 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:03:09.40 | Heidi Scoble | Councilmember Blastene. |
| 00:03:11.04 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:03:11.16 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 00:03:11.22 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:03:11.87 | Heidi Scoble | Councilmember Cleveland Knowles. Yeah. |
| 00:03:13.94 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:03:14.63 | Heidi Scoble | Vice Mayor Kellman. Here. Mayor Hoffman. uh, |
| 00:03:18.97 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:03:20.13 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:03:20.56 | Jill Hoffman | Um, We don't have any announcements from closed session and moving on. um, I don't believe we have any special presentations tonight. we do have a proclamation that I will read. I will need a minute to bring it up though. |
| 00:03:50.78 | Jill Hoffman | And so this is under special presentations. This is item one a, and this is a proclamation of the city of Sausalito supporting |
| 00:03:58.46 | Melissa Blaustein | Mm-hmm. |
| 00:03:59.84 | Jill Hoffman | And I will just read it into the record now. Whereas the principle of fair housing is not only state and national law and policy, but a fundamental human concept and entitlement for all citizens and Whereas discrimination based on race, national origin, gender, disability, familial status exclusion of minor children. religion, marital status, and sexual orientation is illegal in California and whereas as a community we welcome all good neighbors recognizing the contributions are written richness tendered by a wide variety of young and old. male and female, people of all colors and ethnic backgrounds, religious traditions and Thank you. et cetera. Whereas interested parties from both the private and public sectors will participate in a city, state and national effort to promote fair housing Now I therefore Jill James Hoffman, mayor of the city of Sausalio, do hereby proclaim the month of April 2021 to be Fair Housing Month in the city of Sausoleu and urge all residents of our community to personally adopt the spirit of equal housing opportunity. and adhere to the letter and character of the fair housing laws. In witness where I am I here to set my hand and cause a seal of the city of Sausalito to be affixed, 13th day of April of 2021. And so do any council members have any questions? |
| 00:05:28.64 | Jill Hoffman | I see no indication of a question. I will now open up this item for public comment. and I read the following statement regarding our public comment process. The city clerk will call on individuals who have raised their hands in order in the order they were raised, after you are called upon You will be unmuted to allow you to share your comments. Remember public comments are each allowed a total of And tonight it's going to be two minutes because of the volume of public comment on our item seven on our agenda. So two minutes for public comment tonight. Please keep your comments respectful and focused. We want to listen to any individual who requests to speak and each speaker has a responsibility to act in a civil and courteous manner as defined by the chair. I will not tolerate any Um, hate speech, direct or indirect threats, or abusive language. The meeting host will unmute anyone who fails to follow these guidelines. Madam Clerk, do we have any hands raised? And if so, feel free to call on them as you see them on your screen. |
| 00:06:34.33 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, we have Eva Crisante who has raised her hand. I will unmute. Very good, thank you. |
| 00:06:43.65 | Eva Crisante | Thanks so much. This is Eva Chrisanti. Can you hear me okay? Yes, we can. Thank you. Go ahead. Terrific. Thank you, Mayor Hoffman. I want to note the irony of the fair housing proclamation that you're dedicating yourselves now to the spirit of fair housing law. decades after decades of not following it. And when it's far too late for the people who were most victimized, by Sausalito's non-compliance with care housing law. I think we can go back to Shelly versus the people who were most victimized and the families who were most impacted, it's far too late for them to buy into Sausalito. I'd also like to point out that there is an effort for some sort of housing for the most desperately poor people. in in the county or some of the most desperately poor people in the county and that's being done by a young activist named Robbie Powelson. And instead of working with Mr. Powelson, it looks as if the city of Sausalito is not only been fighting him but is now trying to appeal Judge Chen's initial ruling. So I do think it's important. I think it's nice that you have a resolution. I think it does not accord with the reality of how you have actually conducted yourselves as a city. And of course, this does not all fall on the current city council. This is, of course, decades in the making, but it has been so tremendously consistent. And I know right now there's a big fight for residents of Golden Gate Village. And I've seen very little interest from the city council to support those residents. what's important to recognize is that those residents in Golden Gate Village They are the descendants of the people. who were cheated out of the opportunity to buy when their families' wallets were fat in the post-war years and when land was cheap. So talk is cheap. Please do more. Thank you. |
| 00:08:47.07 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Madam Clerk, do we have? Other... |
| 00:08:49.74 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 00:08:49.75 | Jill Hoffman | specifically. |
| 00:08:50.02 | Heidi Scoble | person. |
| 00:08:50.36 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:08:50.38 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Timothy Rempel has raised his hand. Timothy, you've been unmuted. |
| 00:08:55.96 | Timothy Rempel | Okay? There we go. Hi. I'm an architect here in the town. I worked on the Waterfront Commission some years back with many of the, some people present, and many others and have done projects now and then here in the town. It's very appropriate that we have Fair Housing Month. I wanted to delve into this. Also, as a professional but also purely selfishly, my wife and I are building our own home at the south end of town. It's separately in front of the Planning Commission. But what I wanted to raise was the issue here of, and a disclosure, I've had a previous conversation with Vice Mayor Kelman. Um, that in terms of creating fair housing, in towns like this, it's really important that our fee structure are set up systemically similar to other communities around Marin County. There is an extremely high level of planning fees that are currently being assessed by the city of Sausalito. And as a result, can you please send that off? And as a result of that, Thank you. Um, What's happening is we are, for example, we haven't even been in a planning commission hearing yet, and we are already being have paid over $20,000. And the estimate from the outside planning plan checkers that will be another $10,000, $11,000 into this. Planning right now assesses that for our remodel of a home, And the adding a new home next to ours, two units, that we will have approximately $35,000 for the planning fees to review this. We have separately sent into the planning commission. My wife assessed this. She went in and called all the local communities. Ben Rafal Gibran, Puerto Madero, Larkspur, Mill Valley. And the average fees for this sort of project are $4,500. Our fee currently looks like- Your two minutes has elapsed. 35, I'm gonna take- I put... I would just request that this be looked at And possibly that we receive a potential mitigation on this because they're excessive fees. Thank you. |
| 00:11:10.95 | Jill Hoffman | very much. Okay, thanks very much. I remind people we're still on public comment on the proclamation. So do we have any other public comment on the proclamation? If not, we'll move on. to our next item. which is Um, uh, approval of the agenda. |
| 00:11:29.34 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, we have Kevin Carroll who has raised his hand and Ava Crisanti has raised her hand again. Thank you. |
| 00:11:35.10 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. |
| 00:11:35.40 | Heidi Scoble | you |
| 00:11:35.60 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:11:35.63 | Heidi Scoble | And, |
| 00:11:35.97 | Jill Hoffman | we've taken ava's public comment for this item so um kevin carroll that. We welcome your public comment on the proclamation. |
| 00:11:46.84 | Kevin Carroll | Good evening and thank you, Mayor. I just wanted to point out, Well, I don't agree completely with Ava's comments. I would like to point out to her that the Sausalito Library on Wednesday, April 21st is holding a meeting about the past, the present, and the future. of Marin City governance, which to my knowledge is the first that there's a public forum where it's being discussed and it is being done by the Sausalito Library, which is a part of your administration. Thank you very much. |
| 00:12:23.00 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you, sir. Okay, any other public comment on this item, which is the proclamation? Thank you. |
| 00:12:29.67 | Heidi Scoble | Liz Miranda has raised her hand Liz has been unmuted. Thank you. |
| 00:12:37.47 | Liz Miranda | not necessarily the proclamation, but on an issue that I wanted to raise. So if I should speak after, let me know. |
| 00:12:44.06 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. Yes, we'll have a moment later in the agenda for items not on the agenda, so, okay. Any other comment on the proclamation in support of Fair Housing. |
| 00:12:56.40 | Heidi Scoble | Alice Merrill has raised her hand. Alice has been unmuted. |
| 00:13:03.98 | Alice Merrill | Um, fair housing is a wonderful thing. And I'm hoping that we can figure this out, You know me. where they're not in the Marin ship, But I am glad that the city is doing this. And I think that it's, we need to put our, we need to really make an effort to have it happen. and to really mean it that's what I want to say thank you so much goodbye |
| 00:13:33.10 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Okay. Um, Okay. Any other, I see no other hands for this item for public comment. Madam Clerk, can you please confirm that? |
| 00:13:49.62 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, there are no additional hands raised at this time. |
| 00:13:52.86 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Then I will close public comment and we will move on to our next agenda item. I don't see an agenda. I don't think where we approve an item where we approve the agenda. Am I missing that somewhere? I see that we're moving on to communications, but don't we usually approve the agenda before we move on to communications? |
| 00:14:11.97 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Madam Mayor that's agenda item 2B. It's, Okay, I'm right after you reopened the meeting and after the closed session announcements. |
| 00:14:17.37 | Jill Hoffman | I'm going to go. |
| 00:14:24.28 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thank you. It's not on my... It's not on my list. That's okay, that's fine. So after communications, you said, |
| 00:14:34.78 | Heidi Scoble | It's agenda 2B. So it's the Roman numeral 2.B. So it's right after we started. So we kind of jumped ahead into special presentations. but it's typically before special presentations. |
| 00:14:44.21 | Jill Hoffman | but it's different. Oh, my apologies. Oh, that's right. You're right. Okay. My apologies. Okay, we're going to go back and approve the agenda. right um okay can i have a motion please um to approve the agenda in a second if someone is so moved So moved. Second. Thanks very much. Madam Clerk, can you please take the roll on approval of the agenda? |
| 00:15:07.25 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 00:15:07.26 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:15:08.16 | Heidi Scoble | Councilmember Sobieski? |
| 00:15:12.61 | Heidi Scoble | Councilmember Blaustein. |
| 00:15:14.57 | Melissa Blaustein | Yes. |
| 00:15:15.87 | Heidi Scoble | Council member Cleveland Knowles. |
| 00:15:17.49 | Melissa Blaustein | Yes. |
| 00:15:17.90 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:15:18.45 | Heidi Scoble | VICE MAYOR KELMAN. |
| 00:15:19.58 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:15:19.60 | Heidi Scoble | Yes. Mayor Hoffman. |
| 00:15:21.88 | Jill Hoffman | Yes, I think Councilmember Sobieski was muted, but I think We saw the nod of his head, which is sufficient. So, okay. So motion passes and moving on, then we are now back on track. with communications. This is item two on our agenda. This is the time on the agenda for members of the public to provide Any public comment for items not on the agenda except in limited situations state law precludes the council from taking action on or engaging in discussions concerning items of business that are not on the agenda However, the council may briefly respond to statements made or questions posed by members of the public, ask clarifying questions, make a brief announcement or refer matters not on the agenda to city staff or direct that the subject be agendized for future meetings. With that, I will open this item for public comment. If you'd like to provide a public comment, please raise your hand. and clerk will call your name. |
| 00:16:19.64 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, it looks like we have five hands that are raised at this time. The order will start with Liz Miranda and then Ava Crisante. And then Carolyn Revell. Thank you. So Liz, you have been unmuted. |
| 00:16:34.90 | Liz Miranda | Thank you very much for hearing me. I sent a letter very late in the day, my apologies. I thought that the city council meeting was tomorrow. So I wanted to comment on Tim's comments. I've actually. worked with the city of Sausalina, one time was actually asked to be a sustainability commissioner. So we do very good housing projects So I hope everybody has a copy of the two page letter. It went to city council members and planning commission staff. We have worked on over 16 or 18 projects and we do very modest, we believe in infill development, just like the housing proponent comments that you made earlier. I'm not sure. The data that I presented today, I think is beyond the the cost perspective is something that the city should really look at. There is no reason why. the design review planning fee even at the stage we're at, should be at 24,000. and rising to 34. And part of this is a result of the fact that the city of Sausalito has lost staff. We are on our third planning staff and we are in our 11th month. I wrote in my document, which I sent to everybody, the typical process. within most city jurisdictions, and we worked recently with Mill Valley is you make a submittal for a month, you get, one month of reviewing your comments and typically go into the city. for planning commission hearings. In our case, There were so many communication problems beyond the pandemic to the point that we were scheduled for a planning commission hearing at the last minute. the outside plan checker from MIG wasn't aware of all the codes and the conditions with the city of South, so that we had to scrap the meeting and make it a study session. In our history, Typically after a study session, You have a meeting with staff to understand and review the comments. we emailed and asked for a meeting and it took four weeks. And we never did get by the way that staff meeting. In the end, we just went ahead and made our proposal for the changes to our project. This is a serious issue for the city of Sausalud because you are nowhere have any parity with any other city in Marin County. Even the city of Tiburon planning, design planning fees are $2,000. So if you were to- Thank you for your attention, and I hope you will address this, and please respond to the letter that we submitted today. Thank you so much. |
| 00:18:46.93 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:19:00.82 | Heidi Scoble | The croissant, you've been unmuted. THANK YOU. |
| 00:19:03.97 | Eva Crisante | Can you hear me okay? |
| 00:19:05.34 | Jill Hoffman | Yes, please go ahead. |
| 00:19:06.72 | Eva Crisante | I wanted to address, I don't know if this is on the agenda, I wanted to address the sewage spill, 100,000 gallons that spilled recently out of Sausalito. And it's pretty concerning. I want to quote the executive director of San Francisco Baykeeper. He said, it's a relatively large scale spill, which is why it's surprising it went on for days without being detected. The problem is a lot of sewage infrastructure around the Bay area is becoming real old. and it's on its last legs. We experience a lot of sewage spills in the Bay area, especially when it's raining, but to spill almost 100,000 gallons into creeks and potentially the Bay is a really sad situation that could have been prevented. I would like to take the time to explain why our infrastructure is crumbling. And it's because not just here in Sausalito, but all over the state and all over the country, we've poured an enormous amount of money into police and jails and our roads are crumbling our highways are falling apart our bridges are a mess and and now we have situations where you know we routinely have these these this is normal i mean this is this is unfortunately the last time you spilled this much i think it was 50 000 gallons in 2019 this is becoming somewhat routine and you're just one sewage system So this is not good. And I think it's pretty clear that money, especially when you have a police department that's arresting, and specifically your police department, not just the Marin County Sheriff, but your police department is arresting black individuals at a rate that's over eight times their demographic presence in the county, a fact which, with a nod to Mr. Kevin Carroll, whom I absolutely adore. um, the Saucyiddel library is not allowing a discussion of that as a presentation at their library. But we do need to look at the Saucyiddel police, why they've retained Nick White, especially after, you know, his criminal This is something we need to look at and we need to put money back into our infrastructure. Thank you. |
| 00:21:10.09 | Heidi Scoble | Thanks very much. Carolyn Revelle you have been unmuted and then we'll have Wendy Richards and Bradley O'Brien |
| 00:21:21.74 | Heidi Scoble | So Carolyn, you have been unmuted. |
| 00:21:26.53 | Jill Hoffman | Hold on, Carolyn, I think you're not unmuted on your end. Stay again. |
| 00:21:31.59 | Carolyn Revell | evening. Madam Mayor and members of the council, I'm Carolyn Revell, a member of the steering committee for the tunnel project, all our children united. The project was a stenciled handprint by students who live or study in Marin City, and Sausalito. painted on the walls of the tunnel under Highway 101. Additional components will be images, reflective human ship history, and critically much improved lighting The goal of the project is to brighten and enhance the dark and dangerous walkway that our school children from the United Campus is. complex the historic link between our two communities and the communication of our schools This hearing committee consists of representatives from the partnering organizations, Alicia Gaskin from the Ring City for Funnel Stars, Thank you. of Arts Plus, Sonia Hanson of Sausalito Foundation, Susan Shea, and myself representing Sausalito. |
| 00:22:18.49 | Alice Merrill | Daddy. |
| 00:22:23.30 | Carolyn Revell | We've met with the Marin Community Foundation, have endorsements from Marin Open Studios and other organizations. We're in contact with County Supervisor of Stephanie Open Features, who's developing a budget and will seek private funding. Caltrans, the agency with jurisdiction over the tunnel has a set of detailed guidelines for art and transportation to address the first guidelines such as the beautiful contributing funding to hire architects to develop a design concept for the project. we've had preliminary approval of direction we're taking from Caltrans. We wrote a letter asking that we be allowed to present to the design, our design concept to the social justice task force of the council. The mayor responded immediately and we to the mayor and to council I'm a member Loustine. The mayor recommended that we provide a PDF of the design concept as an item on the council consent agenda. at an upcoming meeting. with the objective of receiving the endorsement of the full council for the project. Are there any questions? Thank you. |
| 00:23:30.43 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you, Carolyn. |
| 00:23:32.45 | Eva Crisante | Thank you. |
| 00:23:32.47 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:23:39.69 | Heidi Scoble | Richards has been unmuted. |
| 00:23:42.02 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:23:45.48 | Wendy Richards | Good evening, Mayor Hoffman and... Vice Mayor Kelman. and council members. like to speak very directly to you tonight about an issue of immense importance for the integrity of this city. You've heard the issue before, and you may think it's only an issue of taxes. It is not. Reforming and correcting the business license tax is at the core and heart of the integrity of you five human beings leading our city. There's another letter in today's agenda. outlining The deficiencies in the business license tax. I have gone back and read through prior council meetings. A single mention that home based self-employed people and home based businesses would suddenly be subject to a gross receipts tax. There's no basis. in the economics for tripling the tax on service businesses. There's a host of problems with this current tax. The biggest of which is that it pits neighbors against neighbors. We all work from home. And it, |
| 00:25:18.53 | Jill Hoffman | Hold on, something happened. We lost. We lost Miss Richards there for a second. Hold on. There we go. We're gonna add 10 more seconds. So go ahead. |
| 00:25:29.31 | Wendy Richards | So go ahead. Thank you. I also found out that the company that did the analytical study for this is this very same company that collects the tax Now, in my business, we're not allowed to do things like that. That's a form of structural corruption. And guess what? The business license includes an extra cost to pay the cost of the collection. So not only do we pay a tax, |
| 00:25:54.59 | Bradley O'Brien | to the |
| 00:25:57.10 | Wendy Richards | We pay another tax to collect the tax. I mean, this is just, it is just, completely wrong and I urge you to do it. Do what by when, as you learned on that Saturday session, Correct this before the new city manager arrives. because it's you who need to be the change we want to see. And I want to live in a town that has integrity, that tells the truth to our residents, and that has a council that's here for all of us equally. Thank you very much. |
| 00:26:36.20 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:26:50.21 | Jill Hoffman | Go ahead. I think you've been unmuted, Mr. O'Brien. |
| 00:26:52.66 | Bradley O'Brien | And hi, my name is Bradley O'Brien, and thank you very much for listening to our discussion about the fourth North Neighborhood Association. I think the City Council is very aware of the issues that we have been discussing over the past several months and actually the past year at this point in time with PG&E and and polls and some of our undergrounding issues. FANA, as we call our group, sent a letter to the city council on March 31st outlining some of the background of where we are and we are asking the city council to formally nominate the FANA undergrounding project as a Rule 20A project under the CPUC rules. In addition to the nomination, we're asking basically some wisdom and guidance from the City Council on how best to move that process ahead in a formal fashion. We are one option would be have the City Council actively involved in that discussion. We would like to have a staff person actively involved in assigned to that project. Another option would be to utilize an undergrounding subgroup which I understand the city council has at least floated as a possibility I'm not aware of it being established yet but that could also be a fruitful platform for discussing this issue. I was formerly on the underground committee back when we had an underground committee and I'd be willing to participate in this process I understand the city council is very busy and the Fanta group members are willing to do some of the heavy lifting on this rule 28 project so that we don't burden you with all the details That's pretty much it. We do appreciate your continuing interest in this. We do understand that you understand that the FANA residents are unduly burdened by power lines and power poles and that we believe that the Rule 20A funding would equitable way to solve the problem. provide power to the residents, provide safety when the electric shutdowns, and also would compliment the newly renovated Southview Park because these power poles I'm to align along one side of the Southview Park and the other. |
| 00:28:56.10 | Heidi Scoble | Your two minutes has elapsed. |
| 00:28:58.12 | Bradley O'Brien | Thank you very much. |
| 00:28:59.27 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Okay. Madam Mayor. Alice Merrill, who has raised her hand. Alice, you've been unmuted. Thank you very much. |
| 00:29:07.98 | Alice Merrill | I just want to say that Wendy Richards, I remember when her husband was a city council member Wendy has been here a long time. She has been a very quiet but wonderful community member. And she has been asking for something that is quite reasonable for a long time. And I know when that bill came through, I was talked to by Jonathan Goldman about how wonderful it would be, and I knew nothing, and it said, oh, that sounds reasonable, but it clearly isn't. And I would, I would really like it if you, the city council, would really listen to her. And respond to her. I don't, maybe you are in the background, but she comes every week. So maybe you aren't, but, um, We just, this is a small town. It's a small little town. And we have to respect each other. And Wendy Richards is a, is a wonderful representative of our community as a human being. I just love it if at one time there was you guys talking about this instead of her. Thank you very much. Goodbye. |
| 00:30:26.01 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 00:30:26.04 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Okay. I don't see any other hands raised for Matters not on the agenda. Do you see any, Madam Clerk? Madam Mayor, there are no additional hands raised at this time. Thank you. Then I will close public comment and we will move on to item three on our agenda. specifically item 3A, which is action minutes of previous meetings. So we have action minutes from our regular city council meeting of March 23rd, 2021, our special city council meeting minutes of March 25th 2021, a special city council meeting of March 26th 2021 and special city council meeting minutes of March 30th, 2021, as you can see, we have been busy in between our regular city council meetings. Introducing this, do we have a motion to approve as submitted or are there any motions for corrections? |
| 00:31:28.97 | Melissa Blaustein | make a motion to approve our various and numerous action minutes for the past several special meetings as well as the regular meetings. |
| 00:31:36.82 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. You have a second. I'll say again. Thank you. Madam Clerk, could you please call the roll? Thank you. |
| 00:31:46.47 | Heidi Scoble | Councilmember Sobieski? |
| 00:31:48.10 | Ian Sobieski | Yes. |
| 00:31:48.49 | Alice Merrill | Thank you. |
| 00:31:49.37 | Heidi Scoble | Council member Blaustein. |
| 00:31:50.92 | Alice Merrill | Yes. |
| 00:31:51.98 | Heidi Scoble | Councilmember Cleveland Knowles. |
| 00:31:53.69 | Alice Merrill | Yes. |
| 00:31:54.58 | Heidi Scoble | Vice Mayor Kellman? Yes. Mayor Hoffman? Thank you. |
| 00:31:58.16 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. |
| 00:31:59.01 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:31:59.61 | Jill Hoffman | Very good. Motion passes unanimous. Moving on to our item four on our agenda. Um, Council member committee reports. Who would like to start or I can start? Okay, I'll start. We've had a finance committee meeting. I'm not going to go into too much because we have a report from our finance director later in our meeting. So I'll leave it at that unless the vice mayor wants to augment my report. Councilmember Blaustein and I have continued to work on our as a working group for the racial justice DEI task force. As Carolyn Revell mentioned, we met with her on the tunnel project. It's a project in the tunnel that connects the underpass between Marin City and Sausalito. There's been a lot of talk for a long time about doing some sort of community art project there. and the The title of the project is All Our Children United, which is a great project. And if you want to see a PDF of that, Carolyn was kind enough to send that in as mail and it's attached to our agenda. We continue to work and try to identify potential facilitators for various efforts that we're thinking will be part of our proposal to the City Council and the path forward. We are also talking to community as well as other communities who have gone through this exercise and trying to learn from their efforts. So we are moving at a very deliberate pace. because we want this to be a successful effort in Sausalito and we're giving it. all of our extra bandwidth that we have. at this point. Councilmember Blassie, if you want to augment, I know you've been working on some things too. |
| 00:34:04.76 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah, absolutely. I would just like to augment and just say in light of the really tragic killing of Daunte Wright to remind everyone that it's critical that we acknowledge that Black Lives Matter and this is really important. And it's been a big reminder again of how important this work is. Mayor Hoffman has really been pushing to get our own training for the Council and to find facilitators for us to start doing more work on on this ourselves as well in addition to for other staff so we I also met with the one of the chairs of the mill valley dei task force who shared a lot of great ideas and best practices we continue to meet with community members and we would definitely welcome ideas comments feedback suggestions we are being as deliberate as possible so that we really spend the time necessary to address this issue and give it the weight that it truly deserves. |
| 00:34:52.85 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Okay. Very good. Moving on. I don't know if that's our name anyway. I just want to give an update for those of you who don't know. We filed a motion to modify or dissolve the March 1 2021 preliminary injunction, we filed that on Friday. Anybody who has an interest in reading that or wants an update, it's on the city website. We also filed an opposition to the plaintiff's order show cause on a why the preliminary injunction had been violated. So we also filed that on the same day. both of these filings as well as an enhanced fact page and all of our updates today can be seen on the city website. The hearing on both of these motions will be on April 29th. And there is Zoom capability for you to watch that hearing. That's the update from that effort we continue to work with. you know, county officials with our counterparts in other towns, um, and continued effort find shelter for the people in our encampment that is our highest priority and effort from our group so That's the update from that. I'm probably missing something in the last three weeks, but those are the highlights. So anybody that wants to go next is welcome to chime in. |
| 00:36:20.75 | Melissa Blaustein | I can go next just to report out from the MCCMC Homelessness Committee as a kind of- |
| 00:36:25.21 | Melissa Blaustein | kind of is. |
| 00:36:26.30 | Melissa Blaustein | So just more generally as an update for I attended the MCCMC Homelessness Committee and there are a couple of updates of what's happening countywide right now. Most notably a project Home Key. There's a new series of funding that will be available through Home Key. And just so folks are aware, there are two different types of housing projects that are being funded through federal and state funding for homelessness housing. Room Key, which is the hotel rooms and temporary housing and Home Key, which is a more permanent housing effort. effort. And... that are being funded through federal and state funding for homelessness housing, Room Key, which is the hotel rooms and temporary housing, and Home Key, which is a more permanent housing effort. And the Opening Doors Marin is going to host 10 different informational sessions to talk about what Project Home Key is and where there will be or potentially Home Key sites. So I will be sharing those. Hopefully we can get those into the currents. The first one will be tomorrow at 5 p.m. Um, Also, they just an update that the mobile showers are continuing to be funded through 2022. And so that program is going to be ongoing and just some updates from some of the work that the county has been doing around homelessness they've had uh haircuts covid testings over a thousand meals in sausalito and they also have a marin mobile care unit that's been visiting the homelessness the homeless encampments and one exciting update about that is that they will be offering vaccines to all of the encampments to all the residents of all of the encampments hopefully by the end of April. I have not seen an update since the pause on the Johnson and Johnson distribution announcement today. So that may change things, but evidently there will be vaccines available to the residents of the encampments. So that's good news. Sustainability commission update. There will be another EV chargers proposal that will be sent to the legislative committee. Also really exciting, Mark Palmer, who's one of our newer members at the Sustainability Commission, has been working really hard on a very impressive all electric construction proposal, specifically for Sausalito, which would require all new construction to be electric and not have natural gas. He's actually written the proposed draft ordinance, which we will probably be seeing at the Legislative Committee very soon. Another update from the Sustainability Commission as they continue to work on EV chargers is that they are going to, with new membership, work more on the resiliency hub that we mentioned last time. So the potential for a location with EV chargers and off-grid solar in the event of an emergency. So they continue to plug along and they have two new members. So it's really exciting. Disaster preparedness meeting was postponed and so hopefully will be in the next week and before the end of May. And I think that's it for me. Thank you. All right, who's next? |
| 00:39:06.85 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | I can go so I had the first my first meeting of the countywide priority setting committee, and this is a committee that works countywide. to discuss the allocation of CDBG, or Community Development Block Grant Funding and Home Funds. So just following up on Councilmember Blasdine's comments. community development block grants are a source of funding for a lot of outreach services and other services through a federal grant and then the home funds are another source of funding for affordable housing. projects. We awarded a number of really great grants to organizations throughout Marin County. Relevant to the 94965, we awarded $125,000 to the Manzanita Community Center master planning process that will help with rehabilitating some of the and other issues in the city community center. So that's a great source of community events for all of the kids in our community and probably most of you have been to a basketball game there. help. repair, that facility. We also had a really great presentation apropos of our earlier resolution on fair housing. And I would really like to invite the speaker from that to either come down and speak to our housing element committee or perhaps the full City Council, great perspective on fair housing. in Marin. Um, on housing, Vice Mayor Kellman and I, along with some representatives from the Planning Commission, met with staff on our Housing Proposal Review Committee to talk about the upcoming Housing Element Task Force and RFP. I think some communication went out to the full council. I'm not sure, but. If not, It was really surprising we had no responders to our RFP for a housing element consultant. So that has set us back. We are going to regroup. and see what we can do to identify you know, exactly why we didn't get any proposals and to get that process restarted. Lastly, It's almost three weeks ago now, we had a meeting of the Transportation Authority of and considered allocation of Senate Bill 1 funding to the Marin So now Monero's. and addressed our legislative priorities for the year on transportation and had a great discussion on the safe and seamless mobility Quick Strike Program, which I think I reported on earlier that Sausalito applied, but did not receive one of those grants, but we will continue to move forward on that. So thank you. |
| 00:42:17.90 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Councilmember Sobieski or Vice Mayor. |
| 00:42:27.18 | Janelle Kellman | I can say it's a bit scary. |
| 00:42:27.23 | Ian Sobieski | I can. Sure, I, Vice Mayor and I, attended the EDAC meeting where they have made a extensive report on the more than 300 person hour work they've done on the first of several tasks that city council assigned to them. back in October of 2020. Just a reminder, when the three tasks were to revamp the city's permitting process, to explore how to encourage business development activities, and the third was to commission a marine ship engineering analysis of infrastructure needs. So since that October period, the Economic Development Advisory Committee, as I mentioned, engaged with an extensive process of learning considering and then recommending a response. those recommendations are captured in short in a letter which has been submitted to City Council that my colleagues and the public can read. but is best encapsulated in a presentation that the Economic Development Advisory Committee Chairman Tom Riley presented at EDAC. and also a, uh, for a shortened one that he presented at the Planning Commission meeting, I think at 11.30 at night. So, Uh, It's an extensive presentation. There are some bottom line recommendations that are captured in the letter. that we can take, but I know it was the Vice Mayor's recommendation in mind that that we invite them to come and actually present to the city council at some meeting in time so that we can factor that into our budgetary consideration. Um, That is gonna be my recommendation during future agenda items. Um, Is there anything else I missed, Janelle? |
| 00:44:24.58 | Janelle Kellman | Excellent. |
| 00:44:25.74 | Ian Sobieski | to the United States. So I also attended the Parks and Rec's meeting and there is an outstanding item that we all have to consider which is to remind you, we had five applicants for one spot on Parks and Rec. They can certainly use the extra hands and as the vice mayor points out, I'm sorry, as Mayor Hoffman points out, of course, there's nothing stopping anyone from volunteering at any time. So people are welcome to volunteer. But if we do desire to take advantage of this community interest, at the last meeting, there were several people that did not attend. We barely had a quorum in attendance and I think that we that the Commission could definitely benefit from some additional So we should, if possible, consider increasing the size of the commission. That's all. |
| 00:45:15.05 | Janelle Kellman | Council Member Sadescu, do you want to handle the city manager recruitment report out? |
| 00:45:19.54 | Ian Sobieski | I'll let you do that, Vice Mayor. |
| 00:45:21.23 | Janelle Kellman | Great, well, thank you everybody. That's really great. Obviously everyone's been very hard at work, things coming down the pipe. So city manager interviews and selection. So we had an incredible candidate pool comprising i think a genuine cross-section of background experience and diversity uh so councilmember sobieski and i made the suggestion and the full council supported that we allow our chairs and vice chairs of our eight boards and commissions to interview during a proctored uh session and then the department heads as well so everybody had a chance to meet and then provide summary feedback to the council and to the committee. Then the council had the opportunity to interview the top candidates last week. We were getting very close to concluding the process and hope to be able to provide more details, I think, very, very soon. I'm not sure. Mayor Hoffman, I don't know if you wanted to say anything about the sea level rise task force, but I am extremely excited that we're having our launch meeting this week. So we've been hard at work coming up with a draft game plan as a straw man to discuss around communication and community outreach and infrastructure and climate. So I won't say anything more about that, unless the mayor wants to add. Um, Let's see, I attended the Marine Clean Energy MCE Technical Committee meeting. Thank you. I'm delighted with the work that sustainability is doing, particularly around EV charging. Fantastic proposals coming down the pipe. And not surprisingly, much of the conversation at the county level is also around EV charging. So we actually ran through several opportunities for financing of electric vehicles, incentives to placement of charging stations and other incentives for folks who want to have a private charging unit at their home. And then we also reviewed opportunities for MCE to acquire more renewable energy procurement contracts, which was a really interesting dialogue because of the level of attention that MCE is now giving to various environmental concerns around species and water. So I was delighted to see that as well. Two other things that are happening. We, Council Member Sobieski and I are members of the newly formed PG&E subcommittee. We are not quite sure what that will entail, but I'm sure we will be working with the folks at FANA, and I was delighted to hear Mr. O'Brien offered to be on an undergrounding committee i think that's an excellent idea and so we will talk more about that and then tomorrow councilmember sobieski and i are talking to congressman huffman's office about the machine shop and status it's currently in the gsa surplus process and we hope to have some support in that negotiation so we'll keep you informed on that as well |
| 00:47:58.38 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thank you. At this point, I will open this up for public comment based on our Councilmember Committee reports. |
| 00:48:08.22 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, we have Eva Crisante who has raised her hand and then Vicki Nichols. So Eva, you've been unmuted. |
| 00:48:17.86 | Eva Crisante | Can you hear me? Sorry, can you hear me? Terrific. Thank you so much. Every time I see one of these all white city councils start talking about a DEI task force or a DEI commission, I'm always reminded of De Lampedusa's great novella Il Gatto Pardo or The Leopard, when the scion of an aristocratic Sicilian family faced with the tumult of Garibaldi's Risorgimento makes the statement that if we want things to stay exactly as they are, everything will have to change. And it's a very ironic statement about how people in power make the superficial, you know, efforts toward change or just the appearance of desiring change, putting some commissions together. But they have no intention of actually changing anything. And it does make me quite sad that we are finally getting for example, a resolution on affordable housing after decades of not complying with the law. And now we have a white city council that will probably mimic the mistakes of the Mill Valley DEI. I mean, if you're being consulted by Mill Valley, that was an absolute mess of a task force. And in fact, rather than having them advise you, you might look to areas that are more diverse and would bring more perspective. I have to say it is depressing to realize that it will be the all-white city council who will probably determine who makes it onto that DEI commission and they will be very careful to elide anyone who has brought forward serious research about your police department. So it's all very nice for Ms. Blaustein to talk about Dante. If you're not willing to talk about your own police department and your very serious racial arrest disparities, then it's all for naught. Thank you so much. |
| 00:50:21.47 | Wendy Richards | Thank you so much. |
| 00:50:22.80 | Eva Crisante | Thank you. |
| 00:50:27.78 | Heidi Scoble | Nikki Nichols, you've been unmuted. |
| 00:50:30.68 | Vicki Nichols | Hi, good evening, Mayor and Council members. My ears perked up when I heard machine shop. This has been a passion for years since we first wrote the report in HLB to get this on the national register. But I would urge you now that you are actually actively going to Mr. Huffman's office again, which this had been dropped, |
| 00:50:41.58 | Bradley O'Brien | IN THE CITY. |
| 00:50:41.66 | Wendy Richards | ATTENTION. |
| 00:50:41.87 | Bradley O'Brien | Thank you. |
| 00:50:52.38 | Vicki Nichols | for a while. This property needs maintenance. This property needs enforcement of what the responsibilities of the VA are to stabilize it. This last work was, it's barely patched. There's not gonna be anything to preserve and or negotiate or make surplus. They are totally derelict in their duties. I can't even tell you how strongly I feel about this. So please use Assemblyman Huffman's office. He helped us once before when I was on the HLB. and try to leverage them to enforce their own policies. Thank you. |
| 00:51:36.59 | Heidi Scoble | Sandra Bushmaker, you've been unmuted. |
| 00:51:47.82 | Sandra Bushmaker | Sandra, you need to unmute yourself. Hi, good evening, everybody. I just wanted to piggyback on what Vicki Nichols was saying. with regard to the machine shop Let us not forget that this is a toxic site. And we think that it needs to be addressed head on before the city even engages in any desires or steps in order to acquire this building. So I would strongly urge that toxicity of this building and decontamination of this building be a very high priority. Thank you. |
| 00:52:27.91 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Okay, I don't see any other, oh, nope. Mr. Rex, I believe, |
| 00:52:40.36 | Michael Rex | MIRRIDES. Yeah, hi. I wanted to tag team a little bit on the machine shop. I'd like to bring to your attention. Maybe you know this, but in case you don't, The Richards Bay Maritime Association for the last 10 years has been trying to acquire the Butler building, which is Bayward of the machine shop. We have conceptual plans for a Maritime Museum and a nautical demonstration. exhibit in that building. We have plans, preliminary plans for it. We've pursued for years with the Veteran Association or administration to and acquire that building and open it up to the Bay. Working with that, the dock between the machine shop and in the Bay. And if the city in any way succeeds in acquiring it. We want to partner with the city to create a maritime center there. And if you're interested in seeing our vision and our graphics, we can definitely present them to the council. Thank you. |
| 00:53:48.93 | Carolyn Revell | Thank you. |
| 00:53:49.37 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:53:53.92 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. Now I don't see any further hands. Thank you. |
| 00:53:58.02 | Heidi Scoble | Right. |
| 00:53:58.22 | Jill Hoffman | Is that correct, Madam Clerk? |
| 00:53:59.14 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Madam Mayor, you are correct. There are no hands raised. very, very, |
| 00:54:03.96 | Jill Hoffman | good, then I will close, um, the, this item four on our Agenda which is Councilmember Committee reports, but also want to give a shout out to EDAC and their 33 page report, which is incredibly comprehensive and very, very helpful. Thank you for your work on that. It is not in vain. We will re we will. visit that during our budget discussions and moving forward. um, So thank you for that. Um, okay. So moving on to item five consent calendar. Matters listed on 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. There will be no separate discussion of consent calendar items. However, Before the council votes on 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 consent calendar for separate action. Items removed from the consent calendar will be discussed Later on the agenda and public comment will be heard on any item that was removed from the consent calendar. I'm opening up this consent calendar for public comment at this time. There are five items on the content calendar. |
| 00:55:24.62 | Heidi Scoble | MAPS. |
| 00:55:24.69 | Jill Hoffman | Bye. |
| 00:55:25.18 | Heidi Scoble | I do not see any hands raised at this time. |
| 00:55:28.07 | Jill Hoffman | Very good. Thank you. I will now close public comment on item on our calendar. Um, Do I have a... Motion. to have a motion to approve the either approve the consent calendar as submitted or as or amended. |
| 00:55:49.35 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | I'll make a motion to approve, but I did just wanna make one comment on the COVID. update and thank Abbott Chambers again for a really comprehensive update. One thing I did just wanna add to that, which was so exciting for probably myself and all of the other parents and then 94965, but all of our schools are now fully reopened. and I was out volunteering today. It was just great to see the kids back. So we've got Tam High. back at full strength and they said MLK of course has been open most of the pandemic the last five months and Willow Creek was back at full strength today. It's been a long year for a lot of parents and I just wanted to take a moment to celebrate. achievement. So thanks to all the school administrators and caregivers and parents. |
| 00:56:42.57 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Thank you for that. Yes, that is something to celebrate Councilmember Cleveland-Knoll. So thank you for bringing that up to our attention. Okay, so there's a motion on the table. Do I have a second? second. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Could you please call the roll? I'm sorry. |
| 00:56:59.02 | Heidi Scoble | member Sobieski? |
| 00:57:00.29 | Ian Sobieski | Yes. |
| 00:57:01.30 | Heidi Scoble | Council member Blaustein? Yes. Councilmember Cleveland Knowles. Yes. Vice Mayor Kellman. Thank you. |
| 00:57:07.73 | Melissa Blaustein | Yes. |
| 00:57:08.49 | Heidi Scoble | Mayor Hoffman. |
| 00:57:09.22 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 00:57:09.93 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 00:57:09.96 | Jill Hoffman | Yes, very good, that passes. unanimously. Moving on, item six on our agenda, public hearing, but there are no public hearing items tonight. So moving on to Um, Number seven on our agenda, business items. We have two items on our business agenda. One is 7A, which is sort of a, You could say a mashup. a combination of If I was young and hip, I would say that, but I'm not. So I'm just gonna say combined, we combine, Ferry Landside Improvement Project, and the Bank of America. And that's item 7A. And Then item 7B will be an update from our interim finance director, Charlie Francis, on our fiscal year 2021-2022 budget methodology. With that, Item 7A is received and filed project updates for the Sausalito Ferry landside improvement project and the Bank of America reuse and reactivation project. and include a new project on the 2021-2022 Capital Improvement Program for developing a preliminary report regarding the ultimate vision of lot one that this presentation is going to be given by Kevin McAllen, our Director of Public Works, And Kevin is, I believe is Charlie Francis also going to talk about the Think of America Reuse and Reactivation Project, or are you giving that part of the |
| 00:58:42.67 | Kevin McGowan | Yes, Madam Mayor, I'm hoping that Charlie can step up and provide a little assistance to me and a break within my presentation. So it would be great if we could do that together. |
| 00:58:52.37 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. And Charlie, you know this is going to happen. Thank you. |
| 00:58:54.74 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you. |
| 00:58:54.75 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 00:58:54.77 | Kevin McGowan | I do, yes. |
| 00:58:55.92 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thanks. Thanks very much. Very good. Kevin, thank you so much for all of your hard work on this project. We appreciate it. If you would like to begin with the presentation, please. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:59:09.82 | Kevin McGowan | That would be great. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Appreciate the time and good evening, council members. I'm Kevin McGowan with the Department of Public Works and this evening I'd like to provide you with an update regarding the Ferry Landside Improvement Project. As you noted earlier, Charlie's going to help me out with this presentation. We've got a slide kind of halfway through that he's going to step in and provide a little update with. So with that, I'd like to share my screen, if that's possible, and start the presentation. Give me a quick second here. |
| 00:59:44.97 | Kevin McGowan | There we go, can we see my screen, which is a blue background? |
| 00:59:47.94 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. |
| 00:59:48.79 | Kevin McGowan | Wonderful. Mayor, this evening we do have We may want to allow the members of the local professionals group to add some comments after my presentation, since they have stepped up on a volunteer basis to really help out with this project. So with that, I'll simply get started with my quick presentation here. There have been quite a few updates on this project in the past, which detail the history behind the project. I have a few slides related to the history, but I do recommend reviewing the past staff reports on this particular project if there are questions related to how we have arrived at this point in the project. The city leases the property, leases a portion of property to the Golden Gate Bridge Highway Transportation District, where the dock is actually for their ferry system. The district is planning to replace their existing dock located at the parking lot at parking lot number one in downtown Sausalito. in order to replace the existing ferry dock the district anticipates installing temporary a temporary dock system that will allow the ferry to operate during the removal and the reconstruction of their dock most of the work on the ferry dock will be performed from the water side however the district has noted that the contractor may need to lay they may need a lay down area for their construction The district has not moved forward in the past year with regard to finalizing their bid package and advertising this project. staff has reached out to the district personnel on their schedule for the project that we have not received a response back regarding their latest updates. In October of 2017, the city granted a conditional approval for the Golden Gate Bridge Highway Transportation District to repair their dock system. Golden Gate also agreed to pass funding to the city from a Federal Transit Administration grant to support improvements on the land side portion of the ferry area. The grant language, which is summarized in this slide, includes basic requirements for improving access for the ferry for pedestrians, cyclists, and includes circulation improvements and signage improvements to the area. Parking delineation and the installation of a ticket kiosk are also noted in the original agreement. The funding allocated to this project is limited With a total budget of $2.5 million, this leaves approximately $1.9 million for construction, which in this day is not a lot. |
| 01:02:39.05 | Melissa Blaustein | right? |
| 01:02:39.32 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you. Here we go. um last year city council recommended utilizing a group of local professionals to assist staff with this project the group's goals are composed of several aspects the main emphasis of this group is to develop a design to dissolve develop sorry about that to develop design features that can be supported by the funding for the project and can easily dovetail into future improvements for the area This includes, but is not limited to circulation elements, incorporation of space and views of the area, as well as anticipated future improvements, such as the North South Greenway. The local professionals group recognized earlier, early in the process, that a phased approach associated with improvements is preferred with the limited budget available. Now, I just want to mention that these folks have really stepped up to help us out here. So Michael Rex, Barbara Brown, Robert Hayes, Bill Hines, and Jacques Oldman have really stepped into this and provided a lot of services to the city. The local professionals group has met more than 12 times in the last nine months and developed some very important concept. The area where the efforts were concentrated is basically around parking lot one, which is shown in this slide. In your packet this evening are several schematics which show modifications to the lot. I will go over these in a little more detail in future slides. Option one shown here is an interim vision focusing on expanding the existing footprint of the pedestrian improvements with an emphasis on sticking to the 1.9 million construction budget. The concept also creates a starting point for future improvements, such as the North-South Greenway and possibly waterfront walkway improvements, which are identified in the general plan. The local professionals group discussed important aspects to circulation and perspective uses of the plaza area and wayfinding and also important improvements to El Portal. and addressing some current safety issues with Tracy Way. Please keep in mind that these are not fully developed designs. but simply concepts to help guide the public, the council, and staff to develop a more detailed design for this area that is within the available budget. The local professionals group also identified possible improvements, to the area that may not be within the current budget. We will go over these again in detail in a few minutes, but it is important to understand that more improvements in this area are possible that can emphasize future improvements and connectivity elements to the B of A building, as well as modifications to El Portal. And emphasizing a pedestrian-friendly area and revitalizing this area in Sausalito. |
| 01:06:02.47 | Kevin McGowan | The local professionals group did not limit themselves to just the area of the parking lot. future concepts of whether this area of sausage little sausage lito should remain a parking lot were discussed the concept of turning this into a park setting or any other use were also discussed Modifying this area at this time is not possible with the current grant funding. In addition, this change would not be in conformance with the current agreement with Golden Gate. This is a central area of City Sausalito, and the area may be changed with the latest acquisition of the B of A building. In order to further investigate possible alternatives for this area in the future, staff is recommending the allocation of $25,000 to develop a report regarding the future long-term improvements of this area, which can include a park or any other use. |
| 01:07:07.69 | Kevin McGowan | So a couple of things about our process so far. It's important to note that we are, |
| 01:07:19.55 | Kevin McGowan | Our next step is to have a public meeting and solicit additional concepts and ideas for the work in this area. Our consultant BKF will then gather these details into a recommended alternative to be utilized for the design in compliance with the grant. Staff anticipates returning to council with these recommendations so that we can also solicit your direction on some of these details. We are anticipating these meetings to be occurring in the summer of 2021. There are some very key decisions in front of us as well. A lot of detail items that can influence the cost and the design of the project have yet to be determined. Staff anticipates studying these issues and making a recommendation to the council in the future. One such decision is related to the amount of effort needed to repair the current parking surface. Currently the root system for the mature trees within this lot are damaging the paved surface. Fully replacing the surface will utilize a significant amount of the grant funds. Thank you. However, we might have some alternatives. There may be an alternative for grinding some of the roots and placing a micro seal, which is a much thinner surface and a cheaper cost, on the surface of the parking lot in order to extend the life of the service for about two to five years. This may be sufficient time to move forward with the ultimate vision or modifications to the area. It's important to note that we need the public's help to determine what features are important to the residents of Sausalito. Other issues such as Ordinance 1128 may come into play as the final design is developed. |
| 01:09:16.34 | Kevin McGowan | Right. This one. I was a little ahead of myself. Here we go. Now I'm going to move over to Charlie and hope that he can step up and give us a short little report on the Bank of America reuse. |
| 01:09:28.78 | Charlie Francis | Great, thank you, Kevin. Yes, there's history is up there on the screen basically. The city purchased the building, gave notice of wanting to purchase the building in August of 2020, the Economic Development Advisory Committee held recommendations, and then it was finally acquired. At the meeting on February 23rd of 2020, Um, of this year, 2021, the city council appointed mayor Jill Hoffman and, and uh councilmember Ian Sebeski to um be a working group to help develop their request for information or request for ideas. the, uh, You know, so the, working group has met several times and it became very clear throughout the process that um, that we wanted to bring the two processes together in order to for whoever is proposing ideas on the use of the Bank of America building to be well informed of the options available and the community input so that, you know, the two could be in harmony. So an RFI has been developed. It's scheduled for release probably this Friday. The calendar that was in the staff report. will be adjusted to accommodate that July and August meeting that Kevin just mentioned. And we'll be moving forward and bringing the two processes together. The request for ideas that has been identified has seven major parts. It talks about the formal notice that goes out to the community, gives an overview of the project, talks about the strategy and the existing conditions as well as all of the zoning and planning requirements, goes into the form of the response, and then finally Uh, I mean, almost finally talks about the project objectives to address The project objectives being the benefit to the residents of Sausalito, the building and site development itself, its operational and finance structure, and then it concludes with general terms and conditions. So that's the result of the outcome, output of the working group. and we're going to be bringing these two phases in harmony, the ferry landing project and the use of the Bank of America building. |
| 01:12:00.71 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you, Charlie. I have a couple more slides for us before we move on, just to kind of look at some of the details. So a couple more slides for us at this point. So let's take a look at the details. The professional, the local professionals group identified the expansion the expansion of the current plaza area and improvements to the drop off area. and pedestrian improvements in the main area of this parking area. Modifications to the bike parking and moving this to the east side of the parking lot is also recommended. Traffic modifications, such as closing the end of Tracy Way, because it comes in at an oblique angle to Bridgeway, was also brought up. And the local professionals group also felt that further pedestrian improvements and access improvements along El Portal are warranted. These include the installation, possibly include the installation of a raised sidewalk area on Bridgeway with the intent of limiting vehicle traffic on El Portal. to those accessing the hotel and deliveries. The modifications of this area would further make El Portal more of a pedestrian friendly area. All right. Option two adds to the initial options, which we just took a look at in the slide. And as a pedestrian walkway from the ferry landing to the Bank of America building, the walkway would be a raised platform across the vehicle paths of travel in order to provide a safer access for pedestrians. Additional modifications to El Portal are also noted, such as raising the roadway surface to be the same elevation as the sidewalk to further identify the areas for pedestrian plaza use. The construction in this option would also be with regard to removing some of or all of the trees in lot one and replanting them with less root invasive species and adding bioswales and other filtration systems. So that's just one option. Remember, we're just kind of looking at concepts. We're not saying this is actually going to happen. As noted earlier, the local professionals group did not limit themselves to keeping this area as a parking lot. The park setting, a park setting was discussed, but there are many possible alternatives to this area. While I cannot address all the ideas and aspects discussed by the architectural group, there was an overriding thought in this area to have a central area as the park that provides a sense of place for Sausalito specifically and adds to the views and the corridors here for a sense of ownership for the residents of Sausalito. There were other options that we took a look at. So remember, we have this original one that is just a concept. Here's another concept for a park as well, which expands the plaza. There's just a myriad of different approaches that could be used in this particular area. So that concludes my presentation. It would be good to ask the members of the volunteer local professionals group to address the council if that's all right with the council itself. |
| 01:15:44.55 | Jill Hoffman | Um, |
| 01:15:44.67 | Kevin McGowan | I'm... |
| 01:15:45.04 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Yeah, I think that's fine as long as we keep it to, is it possible to keep it to like five minutes, five to seven minutes? I know it's hard for this group, I sell those names. |
| 01:15:56.03 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you. Yes, I'm hoping for three minutes, but let's see if we can give them a chance. So maybe we can have Michael Rex come up and make a couple comments first, and then we'll work our way through the rest of the group. Michael, are you with us? |
| 01:16:16.99 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you. |
| 01:16:17.02 | Michael Rex | Okay. I think you got to stop sharing, perhaps. I will do. |
| 01:16:22.66 | Kevin McGowan | I will do that. |
| 01:16:23.80 | Michael Rex | Excuse me. Yeah. Okay. Hi. Um, I want you to know that Our group, here we met 12 times. A lot more time and thought has gone into it. A number of us, Jacques Holman, Peter Van Meter, Barbara Brown, myself, We've had two efforts in the past where we've been trying to get more of a pedestrian zone at our ferry landing. So the very heart of our town and the most beautiful part of it is not dedicated to automobiles, but to people. And this is our third push to see this goal achieved. I think it's the best time we've ever had to actually accomplish it. And we have some money to spend, although it's limited. But we've learned a lot about where the community stands on this. because we didn't succeed in the past, we've learned to see what can work for the So I'd like to turn it over to Bill Hines from SWA. It's his group that did the graphics you see tonight all on a volunteer basis. And that graphics you see tonight was polished from graphics that I sketched and Jock Holman prepared. And so it's been a really great team effort. We have some updates that Bill would like to show you very quickly. Go ahead, Bill. |
| 01:17:58.42 | Bill Hines | Sure. Thank you, Michael. Yeah, first of all, it's been a pleasure working with the group here, Michael. Barbara, Jacques. and Robert as well as Kevin. know a lot of their history in in the project and previous planning efforts uh definitely helped inform our current decisions And I think Kevin did a great job of presenting the project. I just wanted to kind of make a point here what we've developed as a group here, has been sort of an arc that can take us from what we're able to fund right now in through a series of phases that will eventually or could potentially move us into a park or plaza idea. And I think this could be a great catalyst for downtown. Um, The feedback in the community seems to be overwhelmingly in favor of this idea. And I think that there's a phenomenal opportunity for the city of Sausalito to move this forward. You know, I think it's sort of interesting that, you know, even to keep the current parking use, you know, we're looking at spending a substantial amount of money in order to make an investment in that area. and if we're doing it in parking It just doesn't seem to be the right thing to do to re-energize our downtown, create a world-class experience, focus on pedestrians, and give us a place downtown that we can really be proud of. And that says something about who we are as people in Sausalito and sort of an attitude about the environment. |
| 01:19:56.99 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thank you. Um, |
| 01:19:58.82 | Bill Hines | Yeah. |
| 01:19:59.28 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:19:59.30 | Bill Hines | Thank you. Who else would like to share? |
| 01:20:05.27 | Michael Rex | Jacques, do you want to add any further thoughts or Barbara or uh, God bless you. If you're there. |
| 01:20:17.57 | Michael Rex | I know one thought that came up about this ultimate plan where MR PALLADINO, I think that's a good question. find it a better place to park cars for lot one. We've been hoping maybe in negotiating something with the battles for some public parking on their property. That's a dialogue that should continue. Um, While a park setting at lot one is one option, as Kevin said, it's not the only one. In fact, I think both Jacques and I are feeling that It needs to be a bit more of a downtown facility, not just a green zone. but it needs some activities and perhaps even some sort of commercial use in a limited way, but to create some sort of activities rather than just a passive |
| 01:21:08.62 | Jill Hoffman | I don't know. |
| 01:21:10.43 | Michael Rex | Thank you. |
| 01:21:10.54 | Jill Hoffman | HAB-Charlotte Pitts, I'm sorry I see job job all men his hands up so let's look great. |
| 01:21:10.56 | Michael Rex | Yeah. |
| 01:21:14.22 | Michael Rex | Oh, great. I'd like to hear from John. In fact, you might add to that. |
| 01:21:18.17 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:21:18.22 | Michael Rex | and then, |
| 01:21:18.39 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:21:18.46 | Michael Rex | Thank you. |
| 01:21:20.94 | Heidi Scoble | Jacques, you are unmuted. So you just need to unmute your microphone. |
| 01:21:24.50 | Jacques Oldman | I think I have. Can you hear me okay? |
| 01:21:27.11 | Heidi Scoble | Yes, we can. |
| 01:21:28.26 | Jacques Oldman | you Okay, so I'm greeting you from San Antonio, Texas. |
| 01:21:31.98 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:21:31.99 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 01:21:32.03 | Jacques Oldman | Thank you. Anyway, I want to emphasize the fact that there's a lot of expense that we are going to have on the parking lot, whatever it is. So this really opens up an opportunity to do something better than a parking lot and spend the money in a better way. So I have been in Saucyot for over 50 years, and I always wanted to see something better at parking lot one. I mean, you know, this is something that's been bugging me for 50 years. To put it to a better use. And I spent hours on committees exploring alternatives, but always felt intimidated by the No Change Ordinance 1128. And that's the thing we've really got to tackle at this point, because parking spaces and their revenue were a precious commodity not to be messed with. But now there are really a number of converging factors that change the environment. First of all, as I said, the imminent expenses that we're going to have on the parking lot. I mean, that just resurfacing, grinding and so on, it just holds for a couple of years. Down the road, we've got significant amounts of money that have to be spent there one way or another. There's also a radical increase in ferry and bicycle coming to Sausalito by ferry and bicycle. When I first came here, there were very few tourists who came by ferry and not that many bicycles. So that was the time that 1128 was created, but the environment is completely different Um, There's also an increased awareness of the need for greater use of public transportation than there used to be. There's an increased desire for outdoor cafe and restaurant venues. I've got to tell you, I first came to the Bay Area in the 1940s. even in North Beach, there wasn't any outdoor cafeteria activity, and certainly not in Palo Alto, where I was, or in Sausalito. So there's a completely different environment now that we need to design for than existed years ago. And also because of COVID, people are working at home are now realizing that working at home may be something that's gonna happen more and more, at least for part of the week. And that's going to create a desire to have in Sausalito a place for people to meet, to have their business lunches and in cafes. So, you know, there really are needs that are very, very different than they used to be. And so I look forward to working with the group to develop this parking lot one into something that works better. And I agree with Michael that I think that it can't be just park because to satisfy Saucyuta residents, there's gotta be more than that. And I have a lot of friends in Sausalito, but I never see them in downtown Sausalito. So I hope someday I will. |
| 01:25:03.91 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thank you. Okay, so we'll go back to Kevin. Do you have any closing? or not closing, but concluding comments for your report, either you or Charlie, and then we'll move into council member questions, and then we'll move into public comment. and then council comments, Thank you. or vote for the resolution. There's one resolution that we're gonna look at. We're not voting on any plans tonight, just so everybody calm down. We're not voting any plans. We have a small resolution for for further funding for just the conceptual plans, right? Anyway, so, anyway, Kevin, any further? |
| 01:25:43.60 | Kevin McGowan | Thank you. Thank you, Madam Mayor. Really appreciate it. I just want to thank the group again and all their efforts to try to put this together. It's not easy gathering concepts from five architects in one room to get to one spot. so very difficult but they have done a a great job in doing so and just want to thank them for that and also want to comment that charlie's tie looks very sharp this evening so just |
| 01:25:56.56 | Bradley O'Brien | So. |
| 01:26:09.72 | Kevin McGowan | Keep an album. Thank you. |
| 01:26:11.29 | Charlie Francis | Thank you. |
| 01:26:11.59 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thanks. And Charlie, did you have any further comments at this point? |
| 01:26:17.43 | Charlie Francis | I do not. Thank you, Madam Mayor. |
| 01:26:19.17 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. Thanks very much. Okay. So, At this point, do we have any questions from Council members, I have one clarifying question which is, I just made kind of a flippant remark about it, As I understand it, from Kevin and both Kevin and Charlie We're not voting on any plans tonight. What's happening, if you can confirm, please. What we're talking about tonight is We're presenting the conceptual choices, we're going to have two public forums. And then Based on that, it will come back to City Council for further direction. Have I got that right? |
| 01:26:59.48 | Kevin McGowan | Yes, that's correct. The only thing that I might mention that might not be correct has to do with the second public meeting. That second public meeting might be held at the council level, or it could be held at a separate meeting itself. It depends upon if we can get conformance with some of the concepts that come from the public as well as this architectural group. |
| 01:27:21.02 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, great. Thank you for that clarification, Kevin. I appreciate that. Okay, yes, Vice Mayor Kalman and then I see Councilmember Blaustein has her hand up so. Thank you. |
| 01:27:30.40 | Janelle Kellman | Yeah, thank you, Mayor Hoffman, and a huge thank you to staff and to our volunteers for they're, just countless hours putting this together and bringing us some such insight and information. I just want to share with the my fellow council members that I'd asked staff a number of questions based on um the communications we received i think we got almost 50 letters and so i just want to let everybody know i received responses from staff on the following questions and i'll let charlie and and kevin respond but i asked what are the monthly holding costs associated with the Bank of America building. And are there any financing terms or key milestones we should be aware of? I also asked about the hotels and their parking spots. I said, do any of the hotels lease parking spots from the city and how is that handled? so that we could have an idea of the parking requirements downtown as well. And then I believe Michael Rex mentioned the Maddens. I asked whether we had had any conversations regarding parking. with the folks that manage South City Yacht Harbor. So I don't know if Charlie wants to jump in and just answer the finance questions, I just wanna make sure everybody has the benefit of the answers I received. |
| 01:28:45.58 | Jill Hoffman | Um... Kevin or Charlie, do either one of you guys want to jump in on that? provide further. updates. |
| 01:28:52.46 | Charlie Francis | The annual lease payments are $78,694. And, So that you know, breaks down to the principal interest and the component problem. Basically, the applicable interest rate is 2.79%. As a final maturity date of June 1st of 2035. The final amount of the lease financing was $1,858,000. So the monthly holding costs are $13,100. |
| 01:29:25.99 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you, Troy. I'm trying to had a follow up on that, but we receive rent from still Bake in America for the ATM, correct? |
| 01:29:33.34 | Charlie Francis | That's correct. I don't have that dollar amount in front of me. |
| 01:29:35.78 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. Okay. Okay. So that, that would, anyway, that, that affects the 13,000. I mean, you know, then you would subtract that out and to get our monthly. Okay. Thanks. |
| 01:29:49.42 | Kevin McGowan | Okay. |
| 01:29:49.50 | Jill Hoffman | . |
| 01:29:50.77 | Kevin McGowan | Councilwoman Kelman, I'm sorry if I didn't get to that email right away, but what I can add is that the Inn above the Tides has their parking underneath their building by itself. So I'm not sure if they would be impacted by any changes in Lot 1. And then we'd have to do a little bit more investigation to see if we lease out any other parking spots. I don't have that information right this second. |
| 01:30:13.24 | Ian Sobieski | I can speak to that because I know that the uh, use Parker lot one for their guests. And, um, very much, I think one of the letters, um, interface from the end of tides and they point to generally supporting investigating the option, but also noting that the parking lot one is important to them. and that there would have to be adequate you'd have to be assured that any alternate parking solution works for them if they're gonna be supportive of the ultimate vision. but that they did very much endorse. the the immediate visions that came from the LPG. uh, |
| 01:30:58.00 | Jill Hoffman | So with regard to the rest of Vice Mayor Kellman's requests, we can respond to those in future staff reports. I'm, Saying yes? Okay, thanks. Okay. Um, Vice Mayor, did you have any other questions? Councilman Blasie, I know, had a question. |
| 01:31:14.85 | Janelle Kellman | No, no more. I just want to make sure everybody had the information that I had received. It was right before the meeting. Okay, great. Thank you. Okay. |
| 01:31:21.03 | Jill Hoffman | Councilmember Blaustein, go ahead. |
| 01:31:22.31 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 01:31:22.33 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you, Mayor Hoffman. And I echo Vice Mayor Kellman's huge thank you to staff and to the local professionals group for your amazing work and time spent on this. I had a question since we are mashing up the B of A and the ferry landing. I'm wondering if from a financial standpoint, we're considering a mashup as well, for instance, if we were to pursue funding from the infrastructure recovery program, if it would all be as one or if we're considering them independently? That's not fully clear to me. Or maybe would it be advantageous to consider them together or have we thought about that? |
| 01:31:54.85 | Jill Hoffman | Well, I think, All things right now are part of the conversation. this this conversation that we are having tonight sort of arose organically between council member Sobieski and I in our separate efforts. It just made sense to talk about this holistically. The point is we wanted to be open and transparent about it with the community and we wanted to get feedback from the community. I just counted the public comments and I think it's an 80 written public comments. We are getting a lot of feedback. Which is good. This is very important to our community. That is where we are. maybe at some point they will actually be, you know, combined as one project, but right now because of the you know, different financing mechanisms and the different RFI project, you know, that's underway. They're sort of separate, but a holistic vision is what I think we're driving toward. So, okay, any other questions? Yeah, yes, Council Member Cleveland-Nolson. |
| 01:32:55.70 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Yeah, just as a follow up. So I had understood from our last conversation on Bank of America that we had formed a working group with you and Councilmember Sobieski and that we were gonna come back with a draft RFI and that we would take a look at and then approve. So I saw the reference to the draft RFI, but I did not see that in the packet. but there was some indication that it was going to be issued this Friday. So I was wondering, when the council will get to review that. |
| 01:33:28.30 | Jill Hoffman | Um, I... Charlie, can you weigh in on that? thought we were going to review it tonight, but I'm sorry. I didn't look at it. |
| 01:33:36.82 | Charlie Francis | Thank you. the the direction of the of the working group was to come back and recommend a process. And the working group is recommending the process of going to an RFI. And so we've drafted one, we're gonna release it. And the working group just thought that just getting it out there was more important than bringing it back to the whole council to review. It's basically a request for ideas that doesn't bind the council in any way. |
| 01:34:09.58 | Jill Hoffman | So, okay. Um, and we were the target for getting that out was. between now and the next city council meeting? |
| 01:34:17.53 | Charlie Francis | Well, the target, I mean, the initial target was this, Friday. But because of the length of the public hearing process going into July and August, it doesn't have to go out this Friday. We just wanted to give the community as much time to generate ideas as they could, as well as participate in the public hearing process for the very |
| 01:34:21.83 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:34:36.48 | Charlie Francis | MR. Very pleasure. |
| 01:34:37.66 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, got it. Okay, so Councilmember Clevenals, why don't we talk about that, during our discussion. about whether or not You know, the rest of the council wants to see it before it gets out. They want to put a comment. So we want to put on the next city council meeting, or do we just want to go ahead and issue? So let's just remind me if I forget, remind me that we're going to talk about that during our |
| 01:34:56.98 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Okay, and then I had one other quick question. So, All the thanks to the local professionals group. I think they did exactly what we had hoped that they would do and we sent this off to them a year and a half or more ago. At the time that we first looked at this, one of the biggest issues was that just, that if we touched the fairy landing. expanded it or repaved it or or whatever, but that was going to cause ADA issues with lot one and thus cause the need to repave all of lot one, which ended up eating up our entire budget. which was really disappointing, I think, to everyone who kind of had more of a, wanted to see more of a vision for this area. So I just wanted to ask our Public Works Director, It looked like at the end of the presentation you were proposing some alternatives, the grinding and possibly just using a seal. So would those options free up some of that $2.5 million for some of the more innovative aspects of the vision? or are we still looking at repaving the whole lot one just to do the near term improvements. |
| 01:36:16.83 | Kevin McGowan | That's a great question, Councilwoman. I really appreciate it. ADA issues are tricky. So at first, when you take a look at the slides that I presented, there was some ideas about improving the drop-off area. That does have to be compliant. So we have to put in some more truncated domes there. Where the actual ADA spots are located is important. They need to be located as close to the ferry entrance as possible. So if we make all of those compliant, And that path of travel to those accessible parking spaces is compliant. We will not have to fully resurface the entire lot. only the access or path of travel to those specific areas needs to be compliant. So the answer to your question is yes, sort of. And that I believe that we can get into those type of details and try to leverage some of the funding that's allocated to this project, to dovetail into some of the improvements put together by the local architects group. |
| 01:37:25.65 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Great, that's really fantastic news from where we started out. So thank you very much. |
| 01:37:32.35 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, any other questions for staff before we move to public comment? I'm not seeing any very good. We'll move on to public comment. I will note, however, We did have 80 written public comments. I read Most of them, almost if not all of them. And so I just note that You know, if you already wrote public I don't want to discourage anybody from public comment, right? But if you already wrote something, understand that it's part of the record, that we've read it, we've considered it. All of these things are important. But if we do have 80 people talk at two minutes a person, then it is about two hours worth of public comment. I'm just pointing it out. So, Anyway, thank you for everybody. for your hard work and So let's go ahead and move to public comment. Madam Clerk, I'll let you call the hands. I see some hands raised, but I'll let you call the order. |
| 01:38:26.79 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you, Madam Mayor. We have four hands raised at this time. Our calling order or public comment order will be Kevin Carroll, Vicki Nichols, Peter Van Meter and David. Kevin, you've been unmuted. |
| 01:38:39.97 | Kevin Carroll | Thank you and thanks to the council. Um, I spend most of my life in front of the B of A, so I have a few comments about the area. Uh, But number one, regarding the building itself, the chamber is going to be opening their new offices. That was the shoe store in a couple of days. And I got a sneak preview of picking up some more face masks there the other day. And it's fabulous. It has examples from a number of the merchants and manufacturers and it's, I would hate for you to do anything to hurt the chamber, but boy, I would steal that idea. for the B of A and I encourage the council members and the the whole public to go take a look of. I've been in this town 30 years. And I was blown away by the variety of stuff. and hope to follow up on it. The only aspect, and I wanna thank Kevin, he's brought a number of these ideas to the feedback where I like to participate and the architects. They've done a lot of great work. We can't argue with the price so far. The one area that I don't think is getting enough attention is the current regarding public transportation, particularly the buses. They drop on all four sides of the building. Three of them they're supposed to. the side closest to the ferry The drivers are not supposed to stop there, but they do when it's raining, so people have less of a distance to run in the rain to catch the ferry. And so I think it would be nice if we could include more work on the buses and getting the local busses a little closer to the long district buses that come from north and south And, I would suggest contacting Transportation Authority of Marin, the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, and Goldegate Transit, and maybe we can stick them with the cost. The other issue would be the tour buses and maybe either they would contribute or something could be done with the fees charged |
| 01:40:42.87 | Heidi Scoble | Two minutes has elapsed. |
| 01:40:43.04 | Kevin Carroll | you Thank you. |
| 01:40:52.62 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 01:40:54.56 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. Good evening, Mayor. I'm going to be very quick because I did not provide comments before. I'm going to just do some bullet points. My first overarching comment is I hope that we pay attention to the recommendations of these wonderful local architects who have given a lot to the community all through the years. They're all very, very talented. And this is wonderful that they've done this. And some of them have used great restraint because I know they'd like to see more down there. So let's pay attention to them recommending phasing. We have this grant from the ferry the G.G. I forget the acronym, the Bridge District. We have postponed this once. I don't wanna see us lose this grant. Let's use it and get the money. Um, I also wanna suggest in this RFI, that you consider you have bought a potentially historic building here in the B of A. Because of that, it is qualified under our local preservation ordinances to be considered for an evaluation. And I think that needs to be done before all the plans are, put forward about how it's going to be altered potentially. AND I THINK THAT'S A In difference to Jacques, who I'm very fond of, I would like to just remind the community that ordinance 1128 was passed in 1997, not all that long ago and it was really uh, because that particular council was making decisions about land use that the community did not want. So that's really the genesis of that. Sausalito Hotel does buy parking spaces there. They're conditioned to do that. There's no other place for them to park. Let's see what else notes do I have? And it's good to see Charlie. who I'm very fond of, and he will remind you that for many years, the parking fees that were generated by this lot have balanced our budget and kept it in the black. So that's a major consideration And the fact that we don't really know what we have going forward with COVID. So not to be taken lightly. That's a. |
| 01:43:00.03 | Heidi Scoble | Only that's a- Thank you. Okay. Next. |
| 01:43:09.65 | Heidi Scoble | Peter Van Meter, you've been unmuted. |
| 01:43:20.87 | Peter Van Meter | All right, now I'm unmuted. Well, this is a fabulous night for Sausalito to see this plaza finally moving ahead. As many of you know, I've been a big advocate for this for at least the last 15 years, but it goes way back earlier there. |
| 01:43:32.27 | Melissa Blaustein | goes way back. |
| 01:43:34.25 | Peter Van Meter | First, Big public support of this was a formal survey done in 2003 So here we are, pretty much on with 20 years. Anyway. I applaud the work of the local professionals group. Fabulous range of ideas. I really just have three points to make going forward here because we've got ample time for detailed public comment. And that is in the interim phases, Maximize the size of the plaza within the 5% land change pool. |
| 01:44:03.83 | Peter Van Meter | allowed within an ordinance that doesn't require any vote doesn't require anything. You just make that closet a big, wonderful open space. within that 5% change rule. Secondly, in the upcoming hearings, we're toward getting an overall concept for the so-called ultimate vision. get some consensus from the public and the council on that. And then, have the design of the interim solutions be in conformity with that ultimate plan so that the underground work |
| 01:44:32.54 | Bradley O'Brien | it's not going to be a |
| 01:44:36.33 | Peter Van Meter | the basic infrastructure and so on doesn't have to be torn up and redone. We finally get the interim project changed to the ultimate project. Those three things keeping in mind, I think, will result in a great solution. I'm so excited. This is absolutely fabulous. Go for it. |
| 01:44:56.90 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:45:05.00 | Heidi Scoble | David, you've been unmuted. |
| 01:45:06.79 | David Sudo | Great. Hi everybody. David Sudo. I think this is a fantastic plan. starting plans, option one and two. I'm kind of a fan of option one to start with, but Um, but ultimately we need to reduce the size of parking in the lot one area. some of the comments the letters brought up concerns and I agree they're concerns about where people are going to park that need parking in the hotels and the restaurants but I would suggest that right now parking is a deal in Sausalito it's much cheaper than San Francisco If someone, if a family of four is coming from East Bay or San Francisco, parking is by far the cheapest way for them to come here right now. And maybe that shouldn't be the fact if we want I'm you know, people to come by ferry or bus or bicycle. maybe we should price their alternatives appropriately. Thank you. um so that they make a better choice and then we won't need as much parking and if and maybe our parking fees won't diminish that much because the people who really need to come by car will come by car. Also, I think this is a great start off for discussion about Just basic infrastructure in Sausalito. Our parking lots and streets were designed mostly 40 and 60 years ago. And I think that our needs and our desires about how we use our our town have changed probably a lot in 40 and 60 years and we need to have that discussion about what our streetscape looks like and how we use it. Thanks. |
| 01:46:48.65 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:46:54.37 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, we have Joan Cox who has been unmuted. And then we'll have Eva Cresante. |
| 01:47:01.48 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 01:47:01.86 | Wendy Richards | Thank you. |
| 01:47:04.04 | Jill Hoffman | Go ahead, Ms. Cox, we can... I think you're unmuted. |
| 01:47:06.88 | Joan Cox | Good evening, council members. Can you hear me? Thank you. |
| 01:47:10.40 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. |
| 01:47:10.84 | Joan Cox | Thank you. Okay, thank you. I also wanted to say kudos to our new staff members for pulling together a lot of historical information. to present such a cohesive report to the council. It's evident that staff has worked very hard to better understand all aspects of this project since the last presentation to the city council. And I also endorse a phased approach as monies become available and the adaptation of future plans to address future needs. But for the immediate future, I wanted to provide some concepts for consideration. Some of the written comments recommend putting residents first by spending city dollars on yet another new downtown park. If we really want to put our residents first, how about relieving some of their inevitable tax burden in years to come? If we have surplus monies as identified in our treasurer's report, what about using them for long deferred maintenance of critical infrastructure, including water transmission lines and storm drain systems? something we discussed at our strategic planning process in both 2016 and 2018 was the city's inability to finance needed maintenance on these systems without taxpayer assistance. Right now our residents have two sewer charges on their tax bills each year, one for collection and one for treatment. Instead of spending surplus monies on a new park, what about relieving the inevitable tax burden that will be imposed on our residents for performing much needed maintenance to our water and storm water systems? What about addressing much needed seawall repairs? To augment what is now essentially a parking project, I'd like to suggest, what about investing in charging stations in lot one? What about investing in solar collection systems in lot one? What about investing in a holistic plan to create a path of travel and coordination amongst all three of our downtown parking lots for people, bicycles and cars? Regarding buses, something we once considered was reducing the size of tourist buses permitted to populate our downtown parking areas. It is concerning to hear it was more important to quickly issue an RFI than to be transparent with the RFI process and allow the entire council and the general public to weigh in on the RFI. With all the- Your two minutes has elapsed. |
| 01:49:22.03 | Melissa Blaustein | Your two minutes hasn't lasted. |
| 01:49:24.25 | Joan Cox | generated by the staff report, why not include the draft RFI with the staff report? Thank you for your time and your efforts. |
| 01:49:31.26 | Alice Merrill | Thank you. |
| 01:49:40.49 | Heidi Scoble | Ava, you've been unmuted. |
| 01:49:42.26 | Eva Crisante | Thanks so much. Can you hear me okay? Thank you. |
| 01:49:44.60 | Heidi Scoble | Yes. |
| 01:49:44.64 | Eva Crisante | Yeah. I wanted to add to David Sudo's comments about bicycle parking. I routinely commute from the East Bay to Sausalito using the new bike path on the San Rafael Bridge. And it's a great trip. I recommend it to everyone who wants to do it. But there isn't great bike parking in Sausalito. And you could actually make, arguably, if you made an effort to attract cyclists and cycling families, real cyclists, not, you know, the kind of crazy tourist traffic, which could come in in another way into the city. But if you really set up decent bike parking in downtown Sausalito near B of A with a monitor, it would be wonderful and people would pay for it. I would certainly pay for it. I'd much rather pay a small fee to the city of Sausalito for secure bike parking than have yet another bicycle stolen from me, which has happened to me multiple times in Sausalito and that's frustrating. So I think with all the talk about how we want to be green and how we want to move forward, I think it is really important to consider David's suggestion. The other issue too, since we have expressed collectively an interest in equity, at least superficially, is if the question is about... |
| 01:51:12.03 | Eva Crisante | the burden on taxpayers, you could considerably lighten the burden on taxpayers by reforming your police department dramatically. I think one of the obvious questions would be why are you retaining officers who have been involved in criminal conduct like Nick White. You could unburden yourself with not only a considerable salary, but you could you know, a pension just with that one move. So I think you need to take a little closer look at that police department. Thanks so much. |
| 01:51:43.29 | Sandra Bushmaker | Thank you. |
| 01:51:47.83 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, I don't see any other hands. Madam Clerk, can you please confirm that? |
| 01:51:53.06 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, you are correct. There are no hands raised at this time. |
| 01:51:56.80 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, so then I will close public comment, and we will bring it back up to the City Council for Council, um, Council comments. Um, would anybody like to kick us off or I'm happy to as well. Okay, oh yeah, okay, go ahead, Councilmember Clegane. |
| 01:52:13.73 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | If you'd like to go mayor, that's fine. |
| 01:52:17.21 | Jill Hoffman | Oh, okay. Okay. So, thank you, you know, again, obviously thanks to everybody that's worked so hard on this. Thanks to our, you know, huge, huge effort from our working group and from our staff and also from both as we sort of looked at this and pivoted a little bit on our view and what we're doing with the added the other, you know, opportunity of looking at B of A and then also looking at a larger vision so I appreciate that very much I think I'm just going to propose that we just as a functional thing that we move the RFI to the next city council meeting it's not going to you know, I just want to remove any issue that anybody would have with it. So we'll do that on our next city council meeting. either attach it maybe to the consent, the draft to the consent calendar, if anybody wants to add or talk about it, we'll take it off and talk about it at the end of the meeting. So I suggest we handle it that way. Um, with regard to 1128 and we're looking at these concepts, right? So This is the start of the public, like I said, the public conversation about this and about the idea of alternative ideas for that downtown area. One of the things that we do need to know a little bit more about is 1128 and how that ordinance 1128 and how that affects that parking lot. I would request that either at the first public meeting that we have, that we have part of a report A short report from the staff on what would be required to amend that. potential draft language for the amendment and what's the timing? If we want to do it this year, then we will You know, I know it's tight. We can either do it. Anyway, we can do it a couple of different ways. And so I would ask that that be included. in the public discussion. Um, Otherwise, I just thank everybody that's working on this so hard and that we're really just trying to do the right thing and come up with the right idea for our community. Thanks to everybody who's weighed in. So who would like to go next? |
| 01:54:34.53 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | I can go. Thank you. |
| 01:54:35.66 | Jill Hoffman | Oh, go ahead, Councilmember Cleveland. |
| 01:54:37.71 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Great. Well, thank you. Thanks to the staff and especially to the working group, obviously. I just had a couple of comments both on the interim vision and then on the long-term vision. I know we're going to take a lot of public comments, so I definitely am open to hearing more and different ideas, but these are my thoughts right now. So on the interim vision, Definitely prefer Option two with the direct path from the ferry landing to Bank of America and onto lot three as a long time commuter on the ferry. That path is how everybody walks anyway, and it's unsafe, and there's a lot of people picking up and dropping off. A lot of families waiting for their parents to come home on the ferry, et cetera. And it's just very congested. So I think a direct path is definitely something that we should consider. And I also think we should take, I think, a public comment that we received in January from one of our bike ped of commissioners was that, you know, if we're going to get, take Tracy way out, that we should get as much bang for our buck from that trade off as possible. And I definitely think that we do need wider sidewalks where there's the pick up and drop off locations and, you know, can make a more generous path through the middle of the parking lot. There's also some hotspots that the Bike Pad Commission identified where there are kind of safety issues. And I think we should drill down on those. I'd like to echo the comments that we need much better bike storage and bike storage, not just for the tourist commuters, but for residents who are both dining downtown, who are commuting downtown, And hopefully some lockers or other pens for electric bikes as well as other bikes. So, I think we do need to move forward along with the Golden Gate Bridge District on that interim vision. And I'm so excited that the working group has come up with, you know, this transitional plan that can allow us to do both, which is just what we were hoping for a year and a half ago. So in the ultimate vision, I did just want to say I love the drawings. I'm so excited by everything. I do think I would add a few things. This ultimately also needs to be a circulation plan. This is the hub of, you know, it's the hub of the ferry. It's the hub of our transit buses. It's the hub of all of our bike traffic. you know, and a lot of cars. And so I don't think that the ultimate vision right now has all of the components that we're gonna need for smooth So for example, ADA, pick up and drop off, needs to be enhanced. our public transit for our workers who are traveling early in the morning, late at night, our school kids, our work, you know, commuters. We need to improve the queuing for taxis and for Uber and Lyft to make that accessible, and then I would say wayfinding. You know, it's very confusing down there right now to almost everybody. So just as kind of a guiding principle to add wayfinding in our ultimate plan. Second, I just want to echo Michael Rex and Jack Allman's comments about activation and community gatherings. that in addition to a park, I would love to see more active uses, you know, permanent artist stalls, farmers market, a pavilion, for rainy day activities. Something, I don't know what it is, and I'm really looking forward to hearing community ideas and having discussion on that going forward. But I do think we have a lot of great park areas right now. And we do need in that kind of commercial center more active community focused, welcoming places. Third, I want to echo the comments that a few folks made on sustainability. that this should be a, you know, we've talked a lot about the sustainability commission in the past and at Bikeped that this should be a model and of all things sustainable bike chargers, EV charging, bioswales, solar demonstrations, et cetera, and of course, C-level rise, if we can find the plan and the funding for that. Lastly, I do want to say we are going to have to have serious conversations about the practical aspects of a transition. with the revenue that we get from the parking lots, the fact that a lot of the businesses actually rely on parking spots there to meet their conditional use authorizations. and of course the revenue that we get from parking and the parking spaces that some of our businesses need. So I'm really looking, I think they're all solvable. I know we can find solutions. I'm really excited to finally turn the switch. from a car centered downtown to more of a path forward. So I really want to, applaud the vision of all the folks that have been working on this. Thanks. Thank you. |
| 02:00:10.94 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:00:11.55 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Thank you. |
| 02:00:11.71 | Jill Hoffman | I see Vice Mayor Kellman has her hand up but I know And then we'll go Councilmember Blaustein and then I think that's a good question. that cleanup since you were on the working group. So anyway, go ahead, Vice Mayor. Thank you. |
| 02:00:26.78 | Janelle Kellman | Great, thank you. I was so pleased to hear that we're going to have really extensive public outreach and comment period and workshops. So I just want to reiterate, Mayor Hoffman, what you said at the beginning. This is the beginning of a dialogue. And so that's why we're hearing so many different options. And speaking of options, I want to suggest maybe option four, since we're throwing out ideas. I think this is an infrastructure project. And I think it's an infrastructure project around coastal resilience and sea level rise. So I pulled the sea level rise modeling from the two maps that are used in the Bay. One is BCDC. |
| 02:00:36.03 | Bradley O'Brien | Just wanted to ask you. |
| 02:01:05.98 | Janelle Kellman | And one is SFVI's Adapting the Rising Shores, San Francisco Estuary Institute. both show significant flooding with a storm event over the next 12 to 20 years, particularly around the Spinnaker Peninsula, but also around the lower half of the peninsula at Gabelson Park through to where the Ferry Building is. But it also shows that there's adaptation opportunities around tidal marshes and wave attenuation mechanisms. And this is important because some of you may know that in 1902, this area was a pond And it was actually filled in, which means it actually would like to be a pond. It probably ultimately liked to be water. So that was really missing for me in the analysis. And Bill Hines and I have had many wonderful conversations about this. So I'm confident it'll come back around, but I think that if we look at this as an infrastructure project to help our downtown area as a protection from sea level rise i think we can find funding both from the thailand's fund and from the state we could find pre-hazard mitigation funding from fema through their brick program so there's a lot of opportunities and i understand the community sensitivity around calling it a park so i don't think anyone needs to get wedded to any one statement or title or definition. It could probably be a lot of things to serve our community. So I just want to throw that out there. So then in accordance with that, I want to make some suggestions for our next staff report or analysis that we received. we may want to have an initial consultation with a sea level rise consultant. I'm not sure. for the comments I made. We may want to do, in fact, we will and should do a parking study. I've actually been working with a few folks to look at our parking revenue across the four lots to understand what is our peak pricing. Do we have any elasticity? And as one of the speakers said, we have the cheapest parking around for a local attraction. And there's opportunities to potentially offset some of the lost revenue if we do a deep dive on not just lot one, but lots one through four. So I think a parking study would be extremely helpful. somebody very good in the police department who's collecting all the data. We have the stats and that option is underway. So I think probably we should look at that at the finance committee level as well. And then we want to make sure, as someone else said, that the local businesses are aligned. So I think Councilmember Cleveland Knowles just reminded everybody at Casa Madrona, Hotel Sausalito and the Inn above Tide all have CUPs with parking requirements that are embedded. So we'll just want to make sure we have significant outreach and understand. those requirements and opportunities There's been some talk about surpluses. I think we definitely the finance community need to do a deep dive to understand that before we start figure out where it goes and what happens and then i think you know to your point mayor hoffman about 11 28 it sounds like it would be a city-wide vote again as much public involvement as possible and understanding And then the last thing, two more things I want to mention. One is if we do pursue a phased approach, I think we should be extremely clear about our objectives and our timeframes. What's the ultimate goal? What are we trying to get to so that we can be sure to really hit that mark? And then my last comment is I also think we should apply a disaster preparedness lens to this. Ferries are actually one aspect of our evacuation routes. So we want to make sure we have clean and quick access, particularly if there is some other type of impediment, whether it's congestion, circulation or flooding. So just a couple of other items that I think we should consider as we're diving into this. Thank you. |
| 02:04:59.21 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Councilmember Blaustein. |
| 02:05:02.40 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you, Mayor Hoffman. And again, thank you so much to the working group and also to the 80 plus members of the public who took the time to write written public comment and who participated this evening. so impressed by the input and ideas that you share. So we really I appreciate that and I appreciate that this will be an ongoing discussion where we'll hear more from all of you. And hopefully we'll work together to come forward with a solution that the community is really proud of and can be excited about. And while I'm excited to see that we have a couple of interim vision options, I'm really excited about asking ourselves the question of, can the downtown really be the heartbeat of our community? And can people really feel comfortable, residents walking down there and having a space that's their own? And I'm really excited to see that. And as someone who... served on the sustainability commission when we were first looking at the land side improvements proposal and Councilmember Cleveland Knowles sat in that meeting as our liaison. And one of the things we were most excited about was creating a sustainability hub there. So I'm really excited to hear from Vice Mayor Kalman about her ideas around sea level rise. And I think that there's opportunity also to have electric bike charging stations and bike storage as mentioned, but also potentially demonstrations for why we're a climate resiliency hub. And I agree that this is absolutely an infrastructure project from the sea level rise standpoint, but also from the standpoint of just a shovel ready infrastructure project per President Biden's new plan for COVID relief. So there's a lot of potential for funding, not just through sea level rise, but generally through infrastructure. I really appreciate it. how much residents express concern, real fiscal concerns about the loss of revenue from the parking lots. And obviously that will take a lot of work to address, but I do believe we have avenues to do that. And I also think we should be realistic about the future of cars, because as much as we all love our cars, it's likely that there'll be a different future in terms of how many cars there are, what cars are self-driving, how many people are using EV bikes, so we might not need as many parking lots going forward and we have to get creative about revenue sources anyway. So I'm really excited to see this coming forward and I'm looking forward to hearing more public comment and ideas and I appreciate what was what's been said by all of the Council members this evening. And I just can't wait to see what's next. And also thanks, Mayor Hoffman, for really promoting transparency and pushing this forward in a way that makes sense. |
| 02:07:27.02 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Council member Sobieski, is there anything |
| 02:07:33.59 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. Maybe thank you to everybody for everyone's work and consideration on this. You know, I think maybe a little level settings were just reiterating that, we have some money from the federal government to do some improvements in this area. and the team of local architects have volunteered through time to come up with with some designs that are gonna be implemented by BKF Engineering to implement Implant those, to spend that money. Those architects all operated under a set of constraints, many of the design constraints we talked about here today, are those. Um, very important design constraint was ordinance 1128, which restricts how much the parking lot number one or any of the parking lots can be modified. the opportunity here when we're talking about a phased approach is is to imagine is to ask ourselves not to waste any money. not to spend money on design features, that are only going to have to be torn up later. if we want to do something else. I'm not sure. And so, That is one way of thinking about the call to action which is to think about what we actually want to do downtown. as an injection. Different people can have, of course, different opinions about what they value. I think the The last account I saw was actually 50 letters. supporting the ultimate vision that was proposed by these architects. But the idea isn't that there's a specific ultimate vision. There's no comparison between the phase one and phase two work that was done at some detail by these architects compared to the phase three, which is really just an aspirational idea of broadening the canvas of what we might I'm just going to say, make a piece of art in. how we might reimagine our downtown. That's really the invitation is over the next two months to get public feedback on what should go on that broader canvas and to then let that influence even what the incremental stages are. For instance, if 1128 never existed, Uh, The phase one and phase two drawings that we saw here today would be different. And so getting some feedback from the community about whether they're willing to modify 1128 to allow current parking lots to be used in some form or fashion. for public park uses. And I used Janelle's turn about Park in the loosest sense of civic space. is really important because it influences actually what phase one could even look like or phase two, much even if we never did phase three. So, you know, 1128 was a great accomplishment because it preserved a lot about the town that would have otherwise potentially been lost. But it anticipates, it says in the very first sentence, Um, Such parking lots shall not be used for purposes other than public parking lot uses without voter approval. It anticipates voter approval and voter approval should and will be asked. to modify 1128. So nothing's going to happen. without further approval and we want to have out of the process to, to get to see what that approval is. So I'm really excited by the openness to this and the broad excitement on the part of the population in Europe. It'd be really neat. to do something dynamic in our town, to uncover the heart of it, to let the jewel shine. to show our ability to engage with sea level rise and with circulation and with urban planning and to actually convey a sense of dynamism. And my only encouragement is not to let our processes bog down our creativity. make sure our processes actually enliven our creativity and actually bring out the best in all of us. I'm confident we can do this and I'm very excited. Just some technical notions is that we need to probably modify the resolution a little bit to make clear how the 25K is being allocated We talked in the working group about something that ended up in the staff report, but not in the actual resolution. And, uh, And then we should probably, I think, make clear direction to staff. I endorse Janelle's comments that, you know, I would say we should actually direct the sustainability commission to engage with the definitive design. around sea level rise, we should ask the park at the pedestrian bike committee to engage with parking issues. I know that Kieran Culligan there actually has done a lot of parking analysis. Actually has a little video, which I would love to be included in a future staff report. showing how one can actually have a completely revenue neutral, have no loss in revenue, even if there was no parking lot one with some very modest changes in, in, the price point in the price point of other things, such as charging tour buses more. when they're here. Um, And I also would like to echo the mayor's comments to get some detailed mechanics from staff on what's required to change 1128. We have probably a recall election coming up. We definitely don't want to do a special election. Those are very expensive. Something like this would be uncalled for, I think. But we do have a recall election coming up and It would be great if at the end of our 60 days of engagement on this issue, we could decide to put that on the agenda if there is that sense that we want to make this change. We only would have to have two words to 1128 when I said, that, 1128 says no other purposes other than public parking lot uses. We could simply say other than public park and parking lot uses. So adding two words to 1128, accomplishes much while still preserving all the important achievements of that ordinance in restricting the ability to sail lease or do commercial development on public market right now. So thank you. |
| 02:13:59.45 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. Um, okay, so Unless somebody has some follow-up comments, then I think Council member Sobieski we can look at the resolution the proposed resolution and do you have any edits off the Um... |
| 02:14:16.58 | Ian Sobieski | So the current resolution just Um, authorizes the money but not how it's spent. And the thought was to give that to the, as Susan Cleveland said, it's a circulation problem. Landscape architects are circulation experts. the proposal is to amend the proposed resolution to add language to that, due to the impacts of COVID on Sausalito's local economy, the architectural schematic services be awarded to the local landscape architecture firm that's a member of the local professional |
| 02:14:54.38 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. Karen Hollweg, And you were taught what and you're you're under the now therefore the city council hereby resolves you were you were editing that sentence. |
| 02:15:02.04 | Ian Sobieski | You know what, I'm just looking at my note. I didn't actually see where it goes exactly, but the insertion is the phrase that I |
| 02:15:09.52 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, hold on just a second then. |
| 02:15:12.89 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | And I would just add, I think a circulation if we're gonna add some circulation, that that's probably, that's a separate, like a traffic engineering type Yes. Anyway, I think we may not need to be that specific. I'm not sure. I've got the resolution. It says allocates. An amount of $25,000 to be utilized to develop a preliminary report regarding converting parking lot one into a park we could just add comma. including any necessary circulation and traffic studies. And I think Janelle had also mentioned and sea level rise. |
| 02:15:52.98 | Ian Sobieski | Susan, our goal was to be able to continue to work with the LPG group. And the thought was to give the professional landscape architecture firm, that's part of that group, the lead in this task. so that they can coordinate, they're gonna continue to coordinate with the other LPG members. but their design brief would be to, to incorporate those objectives as well. I mean, that's what they do. |
| 02:16:21.76 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Yeah, they can probably consult with other professionals |
| 02:16:21.89 | Ian Sobieski | Okay. That's correct, exactly. |
| 02:16:25.05 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 02:16:26.72 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, so then let's, how about this? there's four whereas paragraphs and then there's the now, therefore the city council hereby resolves. allocates an amount of $25,000 The work. |
| 02:16:42.53 | Ian Sobieski | The landscape architecture firm that is a member of the LPG. |
| 02:16:47.29 | Janelle Kellman | Okay. Mayor Hoffman. Can I just clarify with the working group? So this resolution is extremely specific. lot one into a park, but I think we've heard a lot of sort of just alternative uses to lot one. Was it the intention of the working group to be that specific? with the park language or is the intention of this to examine just alternatives to what is there. |
| 02:17:14.91 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:17:14.93 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 02:17:14.96 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, let's just, okay, so then... Thank you. um allocation amount of $25,000 to be utilized by the landscape architect group that's part of the LPG, right? Comma. to develop a preliminary report regarding Um, Regarding how would you want to control? |
| 02:17:34.83 | Ian Sobieski | I think it's clear to the people involved what the what the objective is. |
| 02:17:41.91 | Janelle Kellman | Yeah, but you have to be clear in the resolution because |
| 02:17:42.30 | Ian Sobieski | I'm not admitting it. |
| 02:17:44.75 | Janelle Kellman | five years from now, somebody will come back and read that and probably not want to watch our video. |
| 02:17:49.42 | Ian Sobieski | Well, it, Thank you. |
| 02:17:50.03 | Janelle Kellman | Hopefully the $25,000 will be spent. |
| 02:17:50.17 | Ian Sobieski | You know. |
| 02:17:52.66 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. True. But that's what I was asking the intention of the working group. Did you mean to be that specific? converting lot one into a park or trying to look at alternatives. |
| 02:18:02.21 | Melissa Blaustein | really a short time. alternative. |
| 02:18:04.41 | Janelle Kellman | uses for lot one. How about a civic space? |
| 02:18:09.98 | Jill Hoffman | work. works for me that work for you council member so being |
| 02:18:13.60 | Ian Sobieski | Yes, it does. |
| 02:18:14.68 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, great. into a civic space. Okay. Good? Weissman. Oh, yes. Thank you. Okay, great. That's our amended language. I'll leave it to staff to do the typing on that. But then, so that's our resolution. So we need. |
| 02:18:32.10 | Ian Sobieski | Mayor, could you insert the word, he's, schematic services, architectural schematic is a term of art. |
| 02:18:40.28 | Alice Merrill | Okay. |
| 02:18:40.70 | Ian Sobieski | It really is about the optimal relationship between various spaces and landscapes and between landscapes and the environment. And I think that would attend a little bit to the vice mayor's comment. And it also means something to architects. So |
| 02:18:54.98 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, so you want to add that to the definition of the |
| 02:18:55.03 | Ian Sobieski | Okay. |
| 02:18:59.99 | Ian Sobieski | an architectural schematic of the civic space. Okay. |
| 02:19:02.93 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. Yeah. That's good. Architects of the city. |
| 02:19:07.03 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | motion. I'll second. |
| 02:19:08.11 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. I believe that was a motion that council member Sobieski wanted to make. And I understand that council member Cleveland Knowles is now seconded. |
| 02:19:15.70 | Melissa Blaustein | Great. Thank you. |
| 02:19:17.39 | Jill Hoffman | You're welcome. Can we please? Madam Clerk, could you please call a roll on this? Thank you. |
| 02:19:23.18 | Heidi Scoble | Council member Sobieski? Councilmember Blasti. |
| 02:19:26.77 | Melissa Blaustein | Yes. |
| 02:19:27.79 | Heidi Scoble | Councilmember Cleveland Knowles. Thank you. |
| 02:19:29.54 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah. |
| 02:19:29.86 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Vice Mayor Kelman. Yes. Mayor Hoffman. |
| 02:19:33.76 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. Very good. Thanks to everybody. for your help, everybody. And I mean globally, everybody. Okay, step, we just finished step one in this important journey. Look forward to the rest. Okay. Moving on to our next item on our agenda. Um, We are moving on to item 7B, which is very exciting. It's about our Fiscal year 21-22 budget methodology, and it's going to be given by our interim finance director, Charlie Francis. Charlie, welcome back. Thank you. |
| 02:20:07.36 | Charlie Francis | Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council. Uh, presenting today the fiscal year 21-22 budget methodology. A little bit of history. The, on January 12th, a budget calendar was presented to the city council. In the beginning of March, March 9th, the staff presentations about the quarterly financial report for the second quarter of the fiscal year, the treasurer's report, and then you got the CAFR. Those were important milestones because it helps develop what the, beginning balance is for fund balances in all of the funds. Then in March 23rd, you got a mid-year budget report, which is another milestone report in the budget preparation process that talks about, you know, where are we likely to end up at the end of the current fiscal year. Since then, you know, the resignation of the assistant city manager, finance director, and onboarding myself now. And so the budget preparation process is transitioning to maybe a new calendar, a new process that has more transparency, is more collaborative, and hopefully will be more precise in presentations to the city council. Immediate budget actions that are underway is the labor costing software has been purchased populated and is now ready for scenario. analysis and stress testing. The budgeting templates are being developed in a a tool that can be used in the cloud, remotely and collaboratively by department heads entering information in there. And then we'll be able to share that information, not on Excel spreadsheets, but in the cloud so that we can, so that the deliberations can be more easily facilitated. I've also reactivated the OpenGov transparency site. Monthly budget to actual information is up there. And we're also having weekly updates of the annual report and the balance sheet. So we can track the progress. And then finally, through the budget development process, we'll be using the OpenGov transparency site to track the rest of the milestones. See you next time. can track the progress. And then finally, through the budget development process, we'll be using the OpenGov transparency site to track the rest of the milestones, city manager recommendation, you know, city council reviews, city council adopted budgets. So at any point in time, members of the community, members of the council can, you know, see and track the budget process through its various budget milestone stages. The budget events that are underway right now, we're in department head preparation. That will lead to a city manager review of what the department heads presented. Finance committee meetings and city council public hearings are under consideration. then with the whole goal of adopting a budget on time before the end of June. Oh. We much want to address policies during the budget preparation process. And the policies that we've identified as staff and recommending to the city council are to develop scenarios. A scenario that continues the COVID staffing and the current level of service. Another scenario that gradually returns to pre-COVID staffing and the pre-COVID level of service, or a third scenario where on July 1st, we fully return to pre-COVID staffing and level of service. And you'll be able to see the revenue impacts of all three of those scenarios. We also wanna bring to the city council's attention the level of reserves and the use of reserves and to apply a risk-based analysis to those reserves so that we can know when to use reserves, when to build reserves, and when to release reserves for economic development in the community. We need to have discussions on the use of the America Rescue Plan funds. As City Council knows, we're expecting $1.3 million over the next year. We have until the year 2024, December 31st of 2024, to utilize those funds. And the City Council may want to consider, you know, a strategy of what immediate uses do we want to apply that money and then what strategic uses that we want to apply and staff will be bringing forward recommendations on that as well. And then finally, there's some other resource generation policies that could, you know, affect budget decisions as we go forward as restructuring our pension liabilities in class. OPEB liabilities in class can be restructured and maybe even exploring other department service delivery options. Now the whole goal of budgeting is a little more strategic than it has been in the past. We're moving from traditional budgeting and into an environment where there's a lot of uncertainty. And when there's uncertainty, you have to have continuous forecasting and continuous budgeting. This diagram talks about how a strategic plan's visions, missions, and goals translate into a long-term financial plan, be it five years or 10 years, and then that usually populates the annual budget. Where continuous forecasting and budgeting usually breaks down is between the implementation of the annual budget, where continuous forecasting and budgeting usually breaks down is between the implementation of the annual budget and the actual results recalibrating a five-year financial plan, looking to see if we're still in alignment with our vision, missions, and goals, and eventually the community needs and expectations. So this kind of methodology is applied throughout the fiscal year at every policy decision the city council makes, at every budget to actual report, right? weekly, monthly, quarterly, semi-annually, we're looking and recalibrating our long financial plan. Are we on track to continue meeting our goals and objectives? You might say that it's an evolution from traditional budgeting to advanced budgeting where we started off with just taking last year's results and increasing it or decreasing it by a certain percentage. Top down where upper management just defines bottom up department heads, you know, you know, talk about what they need to operate or a true zero based where you start with a clean slate and have to have a business plan justified to get any funding at all. But now we're moving into a phase where we'll be able to do continuous forecasting. It's forward looking. It's not limited to a fiscal year. It has regular touch points. It has trigger events. In other words, if we move to a scenario where we start off with continued COVID staffing, but it's the strategic goal of the city council to get to full return, then we want to put together a plan of action that looks at certain trigger events in the economy. We see sales tax, transient occupancy tax starting to tick upwards. That's a leading indicator that we might be able to gradually return to our pre-COVID staffing sooner rather than later. Or if we see some volatility in our sales tax and transient occupancy tax, that might be a warning sign that, whoa, you know, we better stay the course for another month and two. So we want to be nimble. We want to be able to adapt to our environment and we want to be strategic in the use of our resources. So that's the budget methodology that staff is proposing for the fiscal year 21-22 budget. |
| 02:28:02.52 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, is that it? |
| 02:28:04.03 | Charlie Francis | That's it. |
| 02:28:06.46 | Jill Hoffman | Um, Okay, so would Does anybody have any follow-up questions for our finance director? |
| 02:28:15.20 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Yeah, I have a couple. |
| 02:28:16.73 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Yes, Councilmember Clevenal, go ahead. |
| 02:28:19.30 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Uh, so thanks, Charlie. That was a lot of information really quickly. And, um, I know a lot of these concepts are really good and interesting, but they weren't included in our staff report. I think that's a good question. And I am looking back at our January schedule and two things jump out. One is that we've skipped a lot of the steps in our schedule. We haven't had the Council workshop. the strategic planning, and the council study session that was supposed to be today, I think. So I'm wondering, . if to really dive into these COVID scenarios that you've brought up and to kind of give us more time to hear more about those. if it might be appropriate to have kind of a budget workshop with the full council before we you know, these assumptions seem to trigger pretty much everything that's going to happen with our budget. And they've seen like strategic decisions that we should all dialogue about Would, is there, Is a budget workshop even possible with our uh, can compressed schedule. |
| 02:29:44.32 | Charlie Francis | of. We could read the calendar that was in the staff report. I'll bring it back up on the screen. Uh. could be reconfigured to move a budget workshop uh, at our next city council meeting or before our next city council meeting. And then this schedule would all push down a little further where maybe we would then, instead of having finance committee reviews through a two week period, we could move this down and have towards the end of May, a first city council budget hearing, and then have a second budget hearing at the first Council regularly scheduled meeting in June and then a final a third budget meeting Yeah, and you got this down here at the end of June |
| 02:30:33.71 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Okay, thanks. I mean, looking back at the budget, I mean, looking back at our schedule, our original schedule, You know, we usually are kind of, general Um, approach has been to have at least a full Council meeting in May, late May. in order to give us ample time And June. and for full council discussions late May and two meetings potentially in June if we need them. And given that we really haven't had that high level, I would Thank you. I, I'd be in favor of that. Anyway, I know it's not comments, but. Thank you. |
| 02:31:18.04 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. I would be in favor of that too, because I just think with something as critical as the budget, it's really It's great to have the full council involvement and to have extra opportunities for all of us to discuss it together, especially since we haven't had a strategic planning. workshop and so this would maybe kind of fill in some of those missing pieces and we could all discuss it together. |
| 02:31:38.47 | Jill Hoffman | So- Yeah, so okay. One of the things that you know, we have to address is that we're behind schedule with our budget and we're behind schedule with our budget because of the way that our budget was managed up until about a week ago. And so that's pushed everything back and it's thrown. a lot of things off, including the normal workshop that we would have had and i know councilmember cleveland knowles has been talking about this from the beginning but we have not been in a position where we could have had a strategic you know, workshop. to address it. Right now we're at the point where We have a tremendous amount of work to do to get through I'm not sure. to get through our budget and get it done on time. I mean, if you look at the schedule, we're doing daily budget meetings. for two weeks in May. so that we can get through all of the staff, all the departmental reports, where we are and get us to the point where at a city council meeting We'll talk about priorities and we'll talk about how we're going to allocate the budget, right? So it's not It's not like we're not going to talk about that. It's just that we're implementing those efforts into the current schedule. So... You know, that's, that's just, that's just the fact of where we're at. And we can talk a little bit more about how we got there. If you, if you really feel that that would be a useful. use of our time at a city council meeting, We pressed the schedule as much as we possibly can at this point. And so You know, I don't, to What we're trying to do is look at in this time of COVID, right, in this time of recovery and trying to be, as Charlie says, trying to be nimble. That's the other part of it is that to the extent to the extent that we can prioritize, I mean, I'm not against If we had been to the point where we should have been, with our budget earlier in the year, then yeah, we would have We would have had a workshop and we would have had a retreat. It's, The combined things of where we're at functionally with our finance department and where we're at right now in the year for the budget is that we need to start crunching the numbers to figure out where we are. We also need to take into account where we are with COVID. So in our COVID recovery, to the extent that any decisions we make mean anything. in the context of where our budget is compared to last year. We're still in that phase. |
| 02:34:25.94 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | So I get all of that, but it did seem like if I understood Mr. Francis's presentation correctly. He laid out some really important policy driven scenarios as an initial starting point. And I think it would be really helpful. I didn't have time to kind of process all of that. to have a discussion with the five of us on the COVID scenarios, the use of reserves, where is our risk, level with that. I think you mentioned what we want to focus our American plan dollars on. and then kind of our other resources, those all seem like really important policy decisions that I think would benefit from a full council decision ahead of time. So I know we're in a compressed schedule. I've got that. And I know, and I really want to thank and the finance committee for compressing the schedule. um, But I think if we're not on the same policy page at the beginning, we're gonna end up jammed at the end. So I think it would be helpful to be on the same policy page up front And then I didn't let the city manager do her budget. and then come back to council. |
| 02:35:39.97 | Jill Hoffman | So I don't necessarily disagree with that. And so... Charlie. you know, here's the other aspect is that we have full We have full calendars, right? Like we have full city council calendars. So, trying to find where we would fit that in and whether or not we have to have an extra city council meeting just to talk about certain things that we might be able to carve out. Charlie. would we be able to talk about just these policy sort of, overarching policy things. We'll be able to do that. that, maybe the next city council meeting or the first city council meeting in May, would that slow you down at all? in your processing of our budget schedule And can we carve that out to be a bite-sized piece of maybe an hour? |
| 02:36:38.60 | Charlie Francis | the putting it off till May would severely restrict our ability to pass a budget by the end of the year. |
| 02:36:47.49 | Jill Hoffman | Got it. So we're just talking, so then we're talking about |
| 02:36:48.53 | Charlie Francis | So then we'll... But if we did it next week, |
| 02:36:49.53 | Jill Hoffman | before. |
| 02:36:52.21 | Charlie Francis | or even as late as the following council meeting, April 27th, we could probably amend the schedule to get that done. And the second part is an hour is not long enough to run through all of these policy decisions. |
| 02:37:10.24 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, gotcha. Okay, so we'd be looking at a special city council. |
| 02:37:14.62 | Charlie Francis | I would recommend an extra city council meeting workshop kind of during the week, next week or on the weekend. |
| 02:37:22.61 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thanks. |
| 02:37:24.02 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 02:37:24.14 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah. |
| 02:37:24.23 | Janelle Kellman | Vice Mayor. |
| 02:37:24.85 | Jill Hoffman | you Thank you. |
| 02:37:25.22 | Janelle Kellman | Yeah, I just want to add, I wholeheartedly think everyone on the council should be on the same page around our status and the constraints that we have been operating under. And I just want to offer up, I think there's sort of two parallel paths. resolving and reconciling some outstanding questions that would provide levels of information without which I don't think, or the Finance Committee does not think we can make policy decisions. That can run in parallel, but it's different from A CONVERSATION AROUND HOW WE WILL SPEND BUDGET. So I just want to clarify that there are those two parallel paths. And so we can sit for nine hours and talk about how we spend the money, but we do have some very key threshold reconciliation and accounting adjustments to sort of deliver before we actually know what we are dealing And we've talked with, the Finance Committee has talked with Charlie about that. So just wanna deliver that as, Two workflows or two work streams. |
| 02:38:30.97 | Jill Hoffman | I got it, okay. I think we're all clear on that. Anyway, it's a huge lift with many different parts. Okay, so these are our questions to Charlie. So if there's no further questions to our finance director, then let's move it to public comment and then we'll come back up to us to finalize sort of our path forward. Okay. |
| 02:38:52.52 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | I'm sorry, I did have just one more question. I saw on your slide about the budgeting. So we've been basically working with a modified zero-based budgeting system. that we're going to be process. Mr. Francis, you were talking about a continuous thing is kind of one more step, one more level of sophistication hires. Did I have that correct? Again, you were. zooming through your slides. And I would love to get this presentation also posted online. |
| 02:39:25.78 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | because I don't, I think it was probably We didn't have it ahead of time. |
| 02:39:31.06 | Charlie Francis | So... In reviewing Well, was called a modified zero-based approach. But it was. in my mind, It was a really a modified incremental based approach. where we decided on here is a base that will continue levels of service as they are and that from that we're going to say any additional levels of service or any additional activities that we want to undertake have to be justified and and whether you call that a you know a modified zero base or whether we call it a you know a base budget with incremental supplemental budget decision packages. Either way, it is at this level that we're talking about. And moving to continuous forecasting is what we're saying is we're going to take this base, we're going to develop maybe three scenarios of how we would like to progress from the state we're at to the state we want to go, and we're going to develop trigger events that will move us from one stage to the other. So we're continually monitoring, we're gathering data, cleaning, curating, featurizing it, modeling it, and eventually then making decisions and taking actions on it. So it'd be a continuous intelligence forecasting cycle that would bring us to the new level of budgeting that is needed, especially in periods of high uncertainty. I hope that wasn't too, too complex |
| 02:41:12.55 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | No, I think I think I got it the second time around. Thank you. |
| 02:41:16.12 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, Vice Mayor Kilman? |
| 02:41:17.69 | Janelle Kellman | Yeah, and so also then, I mean, this is a different methodology question, but Charlie, how, how can we better understand what we're seeing? Like the balance sheet is based on a modified accrual basis of accounting. But then the statement of activities is full accrual And that when we look at them both side by side, it can be quite sort of complicated. Are you anticipating |
| 02:41:34.42 | Eva Crisante | I can't. |
| 02:41:40.74 | Janelle Kellman | Maybe some type of simplified reporting so that we're not struggling to reconcile those two types of accounting when we're reviewing. |
| 02:41:48.84 | Charlie Francis | Well, Absolutely. the There's been an evolution in financial reporting. because the whole purpose of government is to take money from the community in the form of taxes and fees, intergovernmental transfers, and to use that money to provide services to the community. It's the flow of financial resources. And what we're mostly concerned about is we have a beginning balance, we have revenues coming in, and then we have our ending balance. And is our ending balance an adequate reserve against contingencies? So, as generally accepted accounting principles have evolved. They thought it was very important on an annual basis for the community to step back and say, what is the overall impact on a full accrual basis on the organization? So they roll up like a financial reporting pyramid into that basis. the full accrual way of looking at it is a way of saying, here's the major pieces of information that are affecting our statement of net position. And therefore we should be making policies on the flow of financial resources that will impact those positions. That's why I included in the policy decisions that we needed to discuss things about like our, our debt position, our, our, our pensions and our OPEB and our other restructuring activities. I have some, So, ideas on how we can reduce our liabilities, increase our assets and redeploy our balance sheet to achieve, you know, a better, stronger statement of net position and those decisions result in those policy decisions will result in having either more or less resources for allocation for services. So that so, yes, we kind of tie it together, but we don't make that. a whole financial reporting picture like a CAFR in the budget. We're mostly focused on once we set the policies, then we, what do we do with the resources to deliver services to our citizens? |
| 02:44:03.50 | Janelle Kellman | Great. Yeah, I think we just need a really simple indicator of financial position. Yeah, right. And that's even in that position is normally what we would utilize, but I just want to make sure it's consistent. Some of the other documentation we've been receiving |
| 02:44:07.47 | Charlie Francis | Thank you. |
| 02:44:07.50 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah. |
| 02:44:07.86 | Charlie Francis | Thank you. |
| 02:44:15.13 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 02:44:15.15 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:44:15.30 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 02:44:15.42 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Thank you. Okay, any other questions before we go? |
| 02:44:18.96 | Melissa Blaustein | or go to public comment? And a quick question. Thank you for being here, Mr. Francis. It's great to have you. I appreciate all of your work. And I understand and really enjoy that one of the main one of the ways that you really analyze the budget is through increased and new types of technology. And I just wanted to get a sense to what extent we will be having, you know, modeling's in OpenGov or if you'll be doing some sort of overview for council or for the general public on that, because I think it's a really interesting addition and something really great that you bring. |
| 02:44:49.05 | Charlie Francis | Yeah, actually that came up at a with the department head today as well. So I, |
| 02:44:56.04 | Melissa Blaustein | Yeah. |
| 02:44:56.26 | Charlie Francis | We can use this opportunity of having a budget workshop to not only talk about policies, but also to reintroduce to the city council, how to use the open gov site and, you know, at and. and do some training. When I was here back in, 2015, I actually had like a little many academies of training citizens on how to use the OpenGov site. And so, you know, that's another practice I would like to institute. And you really have to work at transparency. You know, I remember back in 2012, when we first launched the OpenGov site, you know, two weeks later, my mother wasn't even coming to the site. I go, wow, this is the greatest thing. And mom's not even coming, you know, but over the course of the years, I learned that you have to tell people to come. And so whenever the city manager put out a newsletter about a, you know, a certain action item, then I would hyperlink it so that people could would know they could go there. And we started using the site in a way that, that restored the biggest deficit there is in government, and that's the deficit in public trust. And so you'll start to see me in fiscal impact sections of staff reports where there's a number |
| 02:46:05.14 | Bradley O'Brien | you know, |
| 02:46:12.95 | Charlie Francis | then I'll link it to the OpenGov site so at any point in time you can click it, see the number in the financial statements, how it relates to our revenues and our other expenses, you know, and then come down and make your your decision from an informed basis. |
| 02:46:28.36 | Melissa Blaustein | I would love to see that in our budgeting workshops, so thank you for bringing that back to the city. Thank you. |
| 02:46:33.24 | Jill Hoffman | Well, |
| 02:46:33.47 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:46:33.52 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Okay, any other questions for Mr. Francis before we go to public comment? No, not seeing any. Okay, I'm going to open public comment this time. |
| 02:46:47.89 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, I'm not seeing any hands that are raised at this time. Okay, thank you, Madam Clerk. |
| 02:46:53.93 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. and I will close public comment. And we will come back to our council. Okay, we're going to look for a time for a workshop. And Mr. Francis is going to tell us how much time he's going to need. and we will put that on our calendar. and, I think. That's all the action we need at this point. Is that right? I don't think we need anything else. So Thank you so much. |
| 02:47:22.46 | Charlie Francis | Thank you. |
| 02:47:22.85 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:47:23.52 | Charlie Francis | I don't know. |
| 02:47:23.74 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 02:47:24.39 | Charlie Francis | Yeah, so Mayor and Council, I would recommend that we spend a minimum of an hour on each one of these topics. And then if we bring in the OpenGov.com. discussion. Let's bring in a working lunch. Let's plan on a six hour meeting. I think that would be productive. You would get the most benefit out of it. And it would be the best information to inform staff on how to proceed with preparing a budget. |
| 02:47:55.42 | Janelle Kellman | I think I just heard you offered a biased lunch. I am in. |
| 02:47:59.60 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah, understanding this will be on Zoom, right? |
| 02:48:02.51 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Okay. Yeah, I'd just say if we're going to do that, that sounds great. But if we could look at the weekend days, that would be super helpful for me. |
| 02:48:13.52 | Jill Hoffman | Okay? Alright, uh, alright then. Staff, send out a doodle poll. six hours. Awesome. I love you guys. I'm so glad we're such good friends. Okay. So, um, Yeah, and lunch. Okay, thanks, Charlie. Thank you very much. Moving on. We're closing in. |
| 02:48:32.12 | Charlie Francis | I'm proposing. |
| 02:48:34.85 | Jill Hoffman | No, we'll send out a doodle poll. We all need to look at our calendars. Yeah, we all got to look at our calendars to see. |
| 02:48:37.56 | Charlie Francis | So we all need a little bit. |
| 02:48:41.00 | Jill Hoffman | when we've got six hours. Okay, very good. Moving on, closing this item. All right. Uh, we're now moving on to item eight. City Manager reports City Council appointments and other Council business |
| 02:48:57.00 | Bradley O'Brien | Amen. |
| 02:49:01.81 | Jill Hoffman | Um, public comment item Yeah. Items under Section 8 are we take public comment at one time. And so The item I'll just refresh everybody's memory. Section eight, our city manager information for a council. city manager recruitment update, although we've already had that. So that's, we had that earlier in our committee report. We will have... the city manager information for council, anything else that our interim city manager, Marsha Raines would like to give us. 8C is going to be appointments to boards and committees. Tonight we are going to appoint members to the EDAC committee that we did not get to on our night when we were doing it all in one effort on all the other boards and commissions. So we will appoint our new EDAC committee members tonight. under item 8C we will not have discussion. We already had discussion on this or we already had interviews and we agreed at that last meeting that we would simply appoint to EDAC. And so I will open public comment now for items. under for for these items under section eight of our agenda. So I'm opening public comment at this time. |
| 02:50:25.39 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, as with the last agenda item, I am not seeing any hands that are raised at this time. Okay, very good. Thank you. |
| 02:50:32.15 | Jill Hoffman | Then I will close public comment And I will invite our city manager to give her report, our interim city manager, Marsha Raines. |
| 02:50:40.51 | Marsha Raines | Thank you, Madam Mayor and this evening the major item I would have given you report would be the recruitment of the city manager and I think the subcommittee gave an amazing report the vice mayor and subcommittee members so with that I will pass. you |
| 02:50:55.07 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thanks very much. Okay, moving on to item 8C, appointments to boards and commissions. and committees tonight where we are, appointing to members to EDAC, Our staff report very helpfully gave us a grid on this, and so I'm gonna look at it on my own. So we have we interviewed all of these people at our last City Council meeting or not sorry at our special City Council meeting where we interviewed specifically for boards and commissions. So, um, or maybe listed long descent. |
| 02:51:34.42 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Thank you. Mayor Hoffman, I did just want to note, I think we got updated correspondence, but I did flag that one of our interviewees had not originally been listed on our staff report. Bob Lillain. So I think the clerk added 10 minutes in our revised list for anyone who was really organized last Friday and use that. |
| 02:52:01.74 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 02:52:01.76 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Okay. |
| 02:52:02.05 | Jill Hoffman | So, okay, he's on the list that I just opened. So these are the list of people that we interviewed. as potential appointees for our open seats on EDAC, So we have four, three members that we can reappoint. And we have four additional Seats open. And then we also have one alternate that we can appoint. And we have |
| 02:52:30.99 | Jill Hoffman | We interviewed 10 people at our session. I'm just gonna read the names off, |
| 02:52:36.61 | Melissa Blaustein | Can I ask a quick question? Because we got an email late. |
| 02:52:36.74 | Jill Hoffman | I think. |
| 02:52:39.37 | Melissa Blaustein | Aaron Singer is technically not eligible 94965. That was a misnomer, right? He's a resident. Yeah, we do not have any 94965 candidates. Great, just confirming because there was, okay, perfect. |
| 02:52:51.29 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, so here are the names. Um, Fareed Najibi. Scott Thornburg, John DeRay, Sandra Bushmaker, Chris White, Bob LaLanne, Aaron Singer, Chris Gallagher, Sue Averill, and Rachel Danielle. I think that's how I, I'm sorry, Stott, I think is how you say her name. Okay, so we also can appoint for different terms. So we have one year terms, we have two year terms, and we have three year terms. And so What? Oh, thank you, Heidi, for putting that up on. So what, What we talked about, what I think we're going to do is we're just going to read off the names that we're voting for, right? however they fall out in the votes is how they fall out in the votes so Um, And also the terms. I, you know, I'm I'm just going to suggest that we do whoever gets the most votes get the longest terms. Right. So, whoever gets the most votes gets the three-year terms and however that breaks down is how I would suggest that we do it. And then for, for order, I'm going to. unless there's an objection i'm going to reverse the order because i got i got the vote first the last time and so i'm gonna in order to make it some amount of fairness in this, I'm going to reverse. And so I'm going to let, I was just, going to call on council member Sobieski first and then council member Blaustein and then Councilmember Cleveland Knowles and Vice Mayor Kelman and then I'll vote last. with that, If everybody's ready, Council member Sobieski, if you want to read off your- |
| 02:54:49.50 | Ian Sobieski | John DeRay. Bob Leilani. Sue Avro. Don Daglow. Cast green. Teresa Antonia. and then alternate, well, I guess it doesn't matter. All, Rachel, stop. |
| 02:55:12.68 | Ian Sobieski | I'm not sure if the ultimate, if that works, so. I think it's just a vote for her. |
| 02:55:19.50 | Melissa Blaustein | I think whoever gets the least will be the alternate, right? or Whatever, we'll figure it out. Yes. um, Teresa and Kana. Don Daglow, Cass Green. Rachel start. Aaron Singer, Chris Gallagher and John DeRay. |
| 02:55:50.03 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Okay, I have done this a little differently because I thought we were going to vote first on the three incumbents, but so yeah Teresa and Kona, Don Bagelow and Cass Green. |
| 02:55:56.27 | Sandra Bushmaker | CONED. |
| 02:56:01.20 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Um, |
| 02:56:06.80 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Bob, Lallane, Chris Gallagher. |
| 02:56:12.98 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 02:56:15.71 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Scott Thornburg. And do I have one more? |
| 02:56:24.86 | Heidi Scoble | You have two more. |
| 02:56:31.14 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Sorry. Rachel and Aaron Zimmer. |
| 02:56:36.65 | Bradley O'Brien | Bye. |
| 02:56:40.33 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | I guess. |
| 02:56:50.09 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 02:56:50.10 | Jill Hoffman | and all that stuff. |
| 02:56:50.64 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 02:56:53.75 | Jill Hoffman | I think so. Heidi, are we ready to move on? Yes. Just let us know when you're ready. |
| 02:56:58.41 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 02:56:58.94 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. |
| 02:56:59.98 | Heidi Scoble | And |
| 02:57:00.97 | Janelle Kellman | Teresa Ancona, Don Daglow, Cass Green. John DeRay. Sandra Bushmaker. Chris White, Rachel. And Chris Gallagher was my alternate. |
| 02:57:21.71 | Jill Hoffman | Mayor Huffman. Okay, Teresa Ancona, Dawn Daglow. That's green. John Dore. Hold on just a second. |
| 02:57:36.86 | Jill Hoffman | Rob Lillane. |
| 02:57:46.38 | Jill Hoffman | Chris Gallagher. |
| 02:57:55.70 | Jill Hoffman | Sandra Bushmaker and Chris White. So, this is my name. |
| 02:58:02.19 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. eight as well. Can I have one more? Oh, no, no. SELECTED YOUR EIGHT. |
| 02:58:08.77 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. Done. |
| 02:58:16.81 | Ian Sobieski | By my count, Melissa only lived for seven people. |
| 02:58:21.46 | Melissa Blaustein | Oh. Okay. Um, That seems accurate. Hold on. |
| 02:58:33.88 | Melissa Blaustein | Let me see. |
| 02:58:37.73 | Melissa Blaustein | Um, Scott Thornburg. |
| 02:58:49.97 | Heidi Scoble | So for the purposes of county, I'll just put the totals where it says term, but then we can assign the terms after that. So Teresa and Kona has five. Don Daglow has five. Cass Green has four. Scott Thornburg has- |
| 02:59:05.52 | Janelle Kellman | I have this slide. |
| 02:59:07.01 | Heidi Scoble | you. |
| 02:59:07.06 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. I do. I'm going to go. Oh. You said forehead, you put them on. |
| 02:59:11.09 | Heidi Scoble | Oh, sorry. I have Scott Thornburg has three, John DeRay has four, Chris White has two. Bob Lillian has three. Aaron Singer has two. Chris Gallagher has four. Sue Avril has one. And Rachel has four. Thank you. |
| 02:59:36.31 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | I forgot. |
| 02:59:37.37 | Heidi Scoble | Sorry, Chris White has two as well. |
| 02:59:44.67 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 02:59:44.69 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. So then the way the terms are going to go is the top vote getters get the longest terms. and then it goes three, two, and one, right? Yes. |
| 03:00:08.64 | Heidi Scoble | Bye. |
| 03:00:09.02 | Unknown | And |
| 03:00:09.26 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 03:00:09.45 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 03:00:09.55 | Heidi Scoble | and So John DeRay, oh, well, the question is, so there's three three-year terms, one two-year term, and three one-year terms. And it looks like there's a tie for John DeRay and Chris Gallagher. So who would... Rachel? |
| 03:00:26.47 | Janelle Kellman | Thank you. |
| 03:00:26.49 | Ian Sobieski | And, |
| 03:00:26.90 | Heidi Scoble | And Rachel as well, yes. Thank you. |
| 03:00:26.95 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 03:00:27.03 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Yeah. |
| 03:00:27.18 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 03:00:31.30 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 03:00:31.32 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | So one of them can have a two-year term and the other two get one-year terms, is that correct? |
| 03:00:31.49 | Heidi Scoble | Okay. |
| 03:00:35.84 | Janelle Kellman | That is correct. Can we just run through the three of them and just say who you would want to have the two-year term? Thank you. |
| 03:00:44.60 | Jill Hoffman | you |
| 03:00:44.68 | Janelle Kellman | Right. |
| 03:00:44.97 | Jill Hoffman | do that. I'm all the same. Thank you. |
| 03:00:46.44 | Melissa Blaustein | their way this time. |
| 03:00:47.20 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Yeah, yeah, one vote. He gets a two-year term, so I'll start. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. We can start from the bottom end. Go ahead, go ahead, Ewan. |
| 03:00:57.39 | Ian Sobieski | I need to read these, I'm not sure. |
| 03:01:01.90 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:01:02.03 | Janelle Kellman | I'll go. |
| 03:01:02.65 | Jill Hoffman | Chandra. |
| 03:01:02.92 | Janelle Kellman | in. I'll go in the order. John directed. |
| 03:01:11.50 | Heidi Scoble | Chris Gallagher. Chris Gallagher. |
| 03:01:16.96 | Ian Sobieski | for the two-year term, I guess I'll go Chris Gallagher. |
| 03:01:28.49 | Heidi Scoble | So then John DeRay would get the one year term. |
| 03:01:33.40 | Melissa Blaustein | Yes. |
| 03:01:33.77 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. And Rachel would get a one year term. Yes. And so that means that you will need to decide between Scott Thornburg and Bob Lillane. for the last- And Rachel- Thank you. |
| 03:01:56.50 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:02:00.60 | Jill Hoffman | that we have, yeah, because they had the three equal. So you said Scott Thornburg, |
| 03:02:06.04 | Heidi Scoble | and Bob LaLanne. |
| 03:02:06.14 | Jill Hoffman | working. |
| 03:02:08.48 | Heidi Scoble | One could either be the last full voting member and then the other could be an alternate. |
| 03:02:13.31 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. |
| 03:02:17.11 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, do we want to reverse it again? |
| 03:02:21.92 | Ian Sobieski | So who are you voting for? Uh, what are we designating? |
| 03:02:23.45 | Jill Hoffman | Well, |
| 03:02:24.18 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 03:02:26.54 | Ian Sobieski | Who's the alternate is, I guess, the bug we're designated? |
| 03:02:29.17 | Heidi Scoble | The final voting member of EDAC. |
| 03:02:32.02 | Ian Sobieski | I would say Bob Luan. |
| 03:02:36.23 | Melissa Blaustein | Thunberg. Thank you. |
| 03:02:39.18 | Alice Merrill | Oh, wow, that's a lot of money. Thank you. |
| 03:02:42.81 | Liz Miranda | on Berkeley. |
| 03:02:45.71 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. Scott. |
| 03:02:48.04 | Heidi Scoble | and the other. |
| 03:02:51.57 | Heidi Scoble | Mm-hmm. Perfect, so then Scott Thornburg will be the one year term. And then Bob LaLanne would be the alternate then. Yes. |
| 03:03:03.09 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | THE END OF THE END OF THE Thank you. |
| 03:03:04.61 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 03:03:05.47 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:03:05.49 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Okay guys. Okay. Can mayor half man could we just also thank all of the applicants that we interviewed because this was a very hard decision and I think they all would have done a great job. |
| 03:03:17.59 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah. Thank you so much for pointing that out. Yes. And as always, Just because you didn't get a voting spot or you're an alternate, Even if you interviewed, we had great, great candidates There's nothing to stop you from going to the EDAC meetings. There's nothing to stop you from participating on any of the subgroup or efforts that they're working on. And as you can see, in a year, we're going to be looking for Revisiting members. Anyway, thanks. I'm very excited about this group and the level of talent that we have, as always. |
| 03:03:47.67 | Ian Sobieski | I'd like to emphasize that it's a bit awkward assigning these terms. It's somewhat arbitrary, but as you saw, People that are engaged with EDAC are renominated for full terms subsequently, so it was regular order. Wouldn't you expect that? |
| 03:04:05.98 | Jill Hoffman | Now. So, okay, thanks. Moving on then. Very good. Excellent, you guys. Uh, |
| 03:04:10.94 | Heidi Scoble | Madam Mayor, before you move on, could you also accept the resignation of Jacob Wittish Bailey as well? |
| 03:04:17.63 | Jill Hoffman | Yes, do we have to vote on that? Do we have to do a vote on accepting his resignation? Yes. Okay, does someone want to make a motion? |
| 03:04:24.97 | Melissa Blaustein | I take the motion to accept the resignation of Jacob Whitlish Bailey from the General Development Advisory Committee. |
| 03:04:30.33 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 03:04:30.35 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 03:04:30.39 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Um, |
| 03:04:32.71 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:04:32.92 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 03:04:32.97 | Jill Hoffman | We call the roll. |
| 03:04:33.64 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. |
| 03:04:33.71 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:04:33.83 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Council member Sobieski? Thank you. |
| 03:04:36.73 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:04:36.76 | Heidi Scoble | Thank you. Councilmember Blastey. |
| 03:04:38.96 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. |
| 03:04:39.85 | Heidi Scoble | Councilmember Cleveland Knowles. |
| 03:04:41.56 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. |
| 03:04:42.38 | Heidi Scoble | Vice Mayor Kelman. |
| 03:04:43.65 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. |
| 03:04:44.41 | Heidi Scoble | Mayor Hoffman. |
| 03:04:45.64 | Jill Hoffman | Yes, reluctantly, thank you. Thank you for your service. |
| 03:04:48.66 | Heidi Scoble | to, |
| 03:04:48.97 | Jill Hoffman | EDAC. And by the way, thank you to Heidi for making it what could have been a very complicated and confusing exercise very clear. and quick and easy. So thank you. Although not easy, but quick and efficient, I guess I should say. Okay. Thank you so much. Okay, we have a motion. Future agenda items. Anybody wanna add some new future agenda items? I will note that we're gonna add, the RFI to our next agenda item probably as probably as a |
| 03:05:25.89 | Jill Hoffman | You know, the thing. Consent. I told it it's 10 o'clock you guys. Yeah, as a consent item, if anybody wants to pull it off, we'll pull it off, but otherwise as a consent. And okay, other features agenda items. Yes, Councilmember Sobieski. |
| 03:05:40.87 | Ian Sobieski | As I foreshadowed during the committee reports, The initial expectation of EDAC was that they were going to present their presentation. The Planning Commission, they can do as short as a 10-minute presentation or even a more fulsome one and present themselves for Q&A. particularly in light of the budget. I'm curious if the other Council members would actually like to hear directly from them about the outcome of their 300 hours of work. |
| 03:06:10.61 | Jill Hoffman | Yes, I would like to hear directly from them and their outcome of their 300 hours worth of work and their incredibly comprehensive effort. I'm just trying to figure out where to put it in, right? They're talking about |
| 03:06:23.80 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | they're trying to full presentation at the planning commission you know we could watch that and then have a summary and have a conversation. You know, we could make it a shorter... |
| 03:06:35.06 | Ian Sobieski | Thank you. |
| 03:06:36.29 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | presentation. |
| 03:06:37.24 | Ian Sobieski | Susan, it's just 10 minutes. So the opportunity- |
| 03:06:40.02 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Thank you. |
| 03:06:40.04 | Melissa Blaustein | Okay. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 03:06:40.71 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Thank you. |
| 03:06:40.75 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 03:06:40.93 | Ian Sobieski | So the invitation that I would suggest as a future agenda item |
| 03:06:41.00 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | I'm sorry. |
| 03:06:45.27 | Ian Sobieski | is for them to come for their 10-minute presentation and expose themselves to Q&A. |
| 03:06:45.45 | Melissa Blaustein | for the |
| 03:06:49.87 | Ian Sobieski | from us, whatever, like we Amen. appropriate. to inform our thinking as we go into the budget crisis. |
| 03:06:58.26 | Jill Hoffman | Yes. Okay. I like that. So the vice mayor and I will look at where we can fit that in. on the next. over the next. whatever, a month, six weeks, right? When we're going to be deep into budget. Just keep it in mind, There are lots of groups in town that want to talk to us and need to talk to us during budget. I'm just saying. time. Time is very valuable right now. but I definitely think a 10 minute presentation especially since we can watch I was thinking the same thing actually councilmember Cleveland Knowles when they you know, when they talked about their presentation to planning commission. So luckily we have a very good resource on that. Okay. Any other future agenda items? Yes, Councilmember Cleveland Knowles and then Councilmember Blounstein. |
| 03:07:46.10 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | So I think I had a couple in the capital improvement plan item that's coming. There's some other things that are already on our future agenda items that might be rolled into that. And I would just note the North street stairs. |
| 03:07:56.89 | Bradley O'Brien | Thank you. |
| 03:07:59.42 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | easy charging. infrastructure capital issue. Maybe I would ask staff to thank |
| 03:08:01.46 | Bradley O'Brien | and it's not. |
| 03:08:06.32 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | broadly about that and look at our future agenda items so that we might knock off a bunch of things that we've already got on there. I would also, at some point during PB, Sarah Silver, Either before or in the next couple weeks as part of our budget prep i'd like to have a closed session on some of our outstanding legal liabilities. um, I won't go into detail on that. I did also just to the either agenda setting or the Uh, Committee on DEI. you know, there's been a lot of anti-Asian violence in the Bay Area and we've recognized a few other issues, then I just would put that out there as something that we might want to consider giving that some of our employees and many of our residents maybe concerned or feeling anxious about that issue. And then I would note that council member sobieski asked about the rec part Commission augmenting the size so. Thank you. like on there. And then lastly, I would just say that we have a lot of different things going on with sea level rise. And I would love to get have a discussion agendized about who is doing what the sustainability Commission has been working on that issue for many, many years. We also have many general plan policies on that and it's, part of our implementation plan um and along with the housing element and other issues. And so I'd love to, before the task force gets going. Thank you. love to have a council wide discussion about who is doing what on that issue and how to prioritize our resources. |
| 03:09:56.51 | Jill Hoffman | Yeah. I mean, I think we can, we can also talk about that during committee reports too, right? Especially so that we don't have redundancy about who's doing So, Yeah. Okay. So we had a, anybody else? Uh, customer blasting, you had something, right? |
| 03:10:10.53 | Melissa Blaustein | I just noted that the sustainability commission will be sending to the legislative committee soon, the proposal for a requirement for all electrification and all new building. It's okay if it comes up after budget, but that's gonna be coming to the legislative committee. And I think that's it. |
| 03:10:30.60 | Jill Hoffman | Okay, thank you. Okay. Okay, moving on. Item nine is adjournment. So. |
| 03:10:39.07 | Ian Sobieski | Mayor, just as a point of order, I'm wondering if it would make sense to drop into closed session just for the scheduling purposes that we discussed. um, |
| 03:10:50.41 | Heidi Scoble | I'm not sure. |
| 03:10:50.97 | Ian Sobieski | not gonna say any point, I know that we asked staff to send something out and we want to get that scheduled. So, We could do that just somewhat expeditiously since we're all together. |
| 03:11:01.50 | Jill Hoffman | Let me ask this. Does anybody have to, is everybody ready with their calendars to be able to schedule? Are you gonna have to look at your calendar tomorrow and consult with other people, perhaps members of your families, about what days you are available? If that is true, I would recommend we not go into closed session, that we look at our doodle polls first thing in the morning and figure it out sometime tomorrow, right? Let's lock down a day tomorrow. Okay, everybody? Okay, people needed to consult with other people. |
| 03:11:27.10 | Susan Cleveland-Nelson | Okay. I don't need to consult, but whatever works for the rest of the council. |
| 03:11:35.20 | Jill Hoffman | Okay. Let's just commit that tomorrow we're going to get a day. Okay. Okay guys, thank you. And we have two, right? We got two now that we had to look for. One is for our six hour finance committee meeting and then the other one. Okay, all right, thanks you guys. Excellent work from the city council, from the staff, from our public, everybody. Good night. And I'll see you right now. |
| 03:11:57.34 | Sandra Bushmaker | I don't see you. |
| 03:11:59.04 | Jill Hoffman | Thank you. |
| 03:12:12.25 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
| 03:12:17.10 | Melissa Blaustein | Thank you. |
Timothy Rempel — Neutral: Supported Fair Housing Month but raised concerns about excessively high planning fees in Sausalito compared to other Marin County communities, citing personal experience with fees over $35,000 for a remodel project. ▶ 📄
Kevin Carroll — In Favor: Acknowledged the proclamation and highlighted an upcoming Sausalito Library meeting on Marin City governance as a positive step by the city administration. ▶ 📄
Alice Merrill — In Favor: Expressed support for fair housing, hoping the city would make a genuine effort to implement it meaningfully. ▶ 📄