| Time | Speaker | Text |
|---|---|---|
| 00:00:00.91 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. Thank you. All right, our audio is running. and I'm not. Video is working and we are admitting no public right now. |
| 00:00:21.09 | Vicki Nichols | Good afternoon, Madam Mayor and council members. This meeting has been held pursuant to government code section 54953E. And in light of the depletes of emergency, the regular meeting of the city council for May 24, 2022 will be conducted telephonically through Zoom and broadcast live on the media website and cable TV channel 27. |
| 00:00:45.88 | Janelle Kilman | All right, thank you and welcome everybody to City Council meeting this evening. City Clerk, can you please call the roll? |
| 00:00:52.68 | Vicki Nichols | Councilmember Salvia. |
| 00:00:53.69 | Janelle Kilman | and |
| 00:00:53.96 | Vicki Nichols | Oh, they've got my video. |
| 00:00:58.72 | Vicki Nichols | But my video... Oh, pick up my video too. I'm here. Council Member Peeble-Lens. Yeah. Council Member Hoffman. Yeah. Mayor Blavstein? |
| 00:01:13.66 | Unknown | here. |
| 00:01:14.53 | Vicki Nichols | They are coming. Okay. all members are present and there is a quorum. |
| 00:01:19.36 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, thank you. We have many items tonight in closed session. I'll just read them quickly. Item D1, conference with labor negotiators, pursuant to section 54957.6. D2, conference with legal counsel, existing litigation, South Santa Maria County chapter of the California Homeless Union versus City of South Saluto. Item 3, Conference of Legal Counsel, City of South State versus California Affiliated Risk Management Authorities. Item 4, Conference of Legal Counsel, World Property Negotiations for the Bank of America Building. Item 5, Conference of Legal Counsel of a potential case unmanned. Item 6, Public Employee Performance Evaluation for the City Attorney. Item 7, Public Employment around the City Manager. I'll go ahead and interrupt a public comment on the closed session items and city clerk will please explain how we take public comment. |
| 00:02:05.16 | Unknown | And Madam Mayor, if I may, just before the city clerk gives you that instruction, there was a typo in your agenda on item seven that should have been the city attorney position. So we just want to take that item up tonight and just deal with items one through six. |
| 00:02:19.49 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, great. public comment search? |
| 00:02:24.63 | Vicki Nichols | Sir, video or audio public comment participation is limited to two minutes per speaker. If you would like to make a comment, please raise your hand in the Zoom application and you will be called upon when is your time to speak. To raise your hand from the phone, press start nine and each speaker will be notified when the time has elapsed. I'm Madam Mayor, we do have a few hands-faced. firsthand. The first person that I'm going to call upon, it's Oscar Mufario. And Oscar, you've been unmuted and asked to share your video. |
| 00:02:58.01 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. Welcome, Oscar. |
| 00:03:04.88 | Oscar Mufario | Can you guys hear me? Sure, Kim. Hi. Hi, good afternoon, council. I'm very happy that we have a good weather and I know you guys have a lot of work. So I'm going to try to be brief. This is in regard of the ongoing negotiations. I've been a, And I'm a, landscaper working for the Zero-Sas community for four years. I've been very happy transforming the life and enjoyment that our town is very proud of. and I sit down with the council during the negotiations for the 2020 10% total. when Adam was the city manager. I know we're encountering a kind of a, a balloon back into the economy. We see tourism happening. We're very enthusiastic to see people walking the streets of South Salido. And at the same time, there's certain uncertainty on the economy. But I want to be sure, tell you that we've been working very hard. in our departments to keep all the services going. on the sewer. on parks and also on DPW. I'm speaking right now as an individual, I was shocked by the surprise that you guys are looking into a 5% furlough. Now, I understand we just, the future is uncertain. But I also know that the amount that is being thinking that we're going to be saving is being we would like to see that allocated into our families, into our COLA's. Right now we're paying more than gas. I personally commute 100 miles each day from Sebastopol to South Salud to provide the best that I can. And many of the individuals, co-workers that I work, they also have a huge commute. And that's not just gas, but it's also the maintenance and the time away from your family. I welcome the 36 hours, but I also think that going for a furlough and a 5% isn't just during this specific time that we sit very tight during the year 2020. And I just want you to consider that we're part of the family here. And I know there may be some elements in some constraints among your departments, those have to be dealt as an individuals. We can have a lab. Thank you. Thank you. That's all. I just want to share that. Thank you, guys. AND EXPECTED TO BE ABLE TO |
| 00:05:17.97 | Vicki Nichols | The speaker is. Our next speaker is Maria Hernandez. Maria, you've been unmuted and I should share your video. |
| 00:05:29.85 | Unknown | Hi, man. Good evening, dear mayor and council members. My name is Maria Hernandez. I have been in the CDD department for two years. This is the third time that the city is hiring staff for this department. I am on my fourth director. Our department is broken, and now you're asking us to work less hours, take less money home, with inflation being at its highest. We are already providing poor customer service to the residents. So imagine how the residents are gonna react to what you are proposing. Thank you. Thank you, Maria. |
| 00:06:06.50 | Vicki Nichols | The next speaker is, we have it under sewer coordinator iPad. You've been unmuted and I should share your video. |
| 00:06:25.78 | Janelle Kilman | You are muted. |
| 00:06:51.43 | Unknown | Oh, that should work. Can you hear me now? |
| 00:06:52.96 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. you know, |
| 00:06:53.60 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:06:53.64 | Janelle Kilman | You sure can. |
| 00:06:54.79 | Unknown | Okay, thank you. Good evening Mayor Keller and Vice Mayor Blaustein, Council Member Cleveaux-Nose, Hoffman and Sobieski. I'm here to speak regarding the change to our contract proposal that we just were, I learned about yesterday. So kind of, you know, it seems like a one-year contract and the cost of living increase is not taken into consideration. You want to pay us out basically a $4,000 lump sum and a fairly radical restructuring of the city services to have us perform a 36-hour... work week in lieu of a 40-hour work week And also this is, really kind of akin to a 5% furlough the way I see it. I felt like I had already given up enough the last time. without me saying too much other than I'll go along with the program. I'm not sure. So, You know, I don't think it really takes into consideration the skyrocketing costs of living and inflation. or even take into account the massive furlough that you all pushed on to us in 2020. on. I hate to think that you, you think that we would not stand up for ourselves in solidarity against this sort of treatment considering the uh, what we've been through like everyone else I imagine to a certain regard but we're basically and at the lower end of the scale when it comes to at least take-home pay. I don't know. So, you know, I'm not mad, I'm not, you know, I'm actually shocked and frankly, I'm thinking perhaps this is a very dispassionate proposal. I'm looking forward to negotiating beyond this. |
| 00:09:00.37 | Vicki Nichols | beyond Ted, your two minutes have a lapse. |
| 00:09:03.32 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:09:03.34 | Vicki Nichols | Bye. |
| 00:09:03.46 | Unknown | Thank you for your time. I appreciate your consideration. |
| 00:09:03.56 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. Thank you. Our next speaker is Brian Vitale, buy-in. you've been unmuted and nice to share your video. |
| 00:09:17.16 | Brian Vitale | See you, Brian. Good evening, everyone. Good evening mayor. Thank you council members and everyone for having me tonight. I come here tonight to discuss what's happening with our negotiations in SEIU. Most of you know me. You've worked with me. You've talked with me. You've come to programs that I run, events that I run. I do what I love. I love what I do. I love working in recreation. I love working for the city of Sausalito and providing for our community. And I think that what the city is doing for purchasing land and purchasing buildings is a great investment to the city and something that is really wonderful in order to help keep our community for what it is. One thing I would really like to see happen with this as well is making sure that we also invest in our staff. We invest in the people that we have working for our community. There are thousands of tourists that come into town on a regular basis. There are thousands of people that live in our community and count on each and every one of us SEIU members to provide recreation, to provide streets, parks, community development, and so many other things in the city. And I find that it's hard for me to take in a 5% furlough when I'm asked to do more responsibilities with less time and being able to have people come and thank me for my service on a regular basis but then try and tell me that they're going to take five percent out of my salary. It's really disheartening to me with the higher prices and everything else that's happening in this world right now. It would be really great to be able to see negotiations that help our community members along with our staff. I wanna be able to put my best foot forward each and every single day. And I know that's what you want for us too. And I hope this council can discuss in closed session and make the right decisions for our staff to make sure that we can provide a better future for our community because with high turnover rates and onboarding and training that all costs money invest in our people and we keep them for the future so that we can have a better community and your two minutes have a lot thank you so much for your time i appreciate it Thank you. |
| 00:11:36.87 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you very much. |
| 00:11:37.22 | Brian Vitale | Bye. Thank you. |
| 00:11:39.33 | Vicki Nichols | Our next speaker is Megan Lockett. Megan, you've been unmuted. and ask to share your video. |
| 00:11:52.63 | Megan Lockett | Hi, my name is Megan Lockett and I've been the permit tech for the public works department for the last four years. Since I've been with the city, there has been a revolving door with an extremely high employee turnover rate. We endured the mandatory 10% furlough back in 2020, which made our already heavy workload even more challenging, as well as causing a significant financial impact. We strive to provide excellent customer service to the Sausalito community, but implementing another 5% furlough will not help either issue. I really hope you consider these issues during your negotiations and thank you for your time and service. Thank you, Megan. |
| 00:12:35.17 | Vicki Nichols | The next speaker is Ali, Ali, you've been unmuted and asked to share your video. |
| 00:12:41.31 | Megan Lockett | Hallelujah. |
| 00:12:47.35 | Ali | Hi, thank you for taking the call. You know, I've been here for a short amount of time, so I don't know much about the history of what happened, you know, pre-COVID. But in my short amount of time, I realized that, you know, just counting the numbers, there were actually I've been here seven months and I think there's been 14 people that have already left since I started. And I don't know the reason, but I wanted to go through the list because it almost hits every department. You know? I think it just, brings into reality the people that are affected by, you know, whether it's this or whether it's personalities or why they left. But, In administration, there was Robert And then Jane, I think they were both kind of interns In accounting, there was Heather And Stephen Wise. DPW, Kenny left, he was in the sewer department, and parks. Mike Langford left. Julie Myers left. and then CDD Thomas Ahern's is about to leave. ELENA LIVING, has left. Jim Moore was here for a short amount of time. I have left Michael Junasek has left. Oh. And Now Heidi Scoble is about to leave. There's a lot of institutional knowledge that Heidi has and what I don't wanna see is more and more people leaving when there's such valuable resources that we have. And even though they're my coworkers, they're my friends that I've made over the last seven months. Just taking that into consideration. Thank you. |
| 00:14:31.36 | Janelle Kilman | Thanks, Alan. Okay, city clerk, do we have any other Hands raised for public comment on closed session items. |
| 00:14:40.23 | Vicki Nichols | Madam Mayor, it does not appear as we have any other hands-free. |
| 00:14:43.37 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, then we will go ahead and adjourn the closed session and we will be back for open session seven. Thank you. |
| 00:15:01.68 | Vicki Nichols | you Welcome Madam Mayor and we're live and everyone's in the room. |
| 00:15:07.25 | Janelle Kilman | Great, welcome everybody. We're returning from closed session on May 24th, South Seattle City Council. We go ahead and reopen the meeting. We do not have any closed session announcements. So we'll move over to the agenda and I will request a motion and a second to approve the agenda. |
| 00:15:26.89 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 00:15:26.98 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:15:27.02 | Vicki Nichols | Bye. |
| 00:15:28.22 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:15:28.24 | Vicki Nichols | SECOND. |
| 00:15:29.81 | Janelle Kilman | Search, please call the bell. |
| 00:15:31.73 | Vicki Nichols | Councilmember Sobieski. Yes. on some of the people that are. |
| 00:15:35.60 | Janelle Kilman | Yes. |
| 00:15:35.97 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:15:36.78 | Vicki Nichols | on someone in Hoffman. Yes. As Mary Blomstein. |
| 00:15:40.22 | Janelle Kilman | Yes. |
| 00:15:40.58 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. Well, how? |
| 00:15:43.01 | Janelle Kilman | I'm going to do the marijuana and say yes. |
| 00:15:44.63 | Vicki Nichols | I mean, I do. |
| 00:15:46.23 | Janelle Kilman | No problem, no problem. Special presentations, mayor announcements. We will have a special agreement tonight, so we will wait for the special announcement at the end of the meeting. So we'll go ahead to item number two, action minutes of the previous meeting. All right. Do we have any public comment on the meeting minutes? |
| 00:16:11.79 | Janelle Kilman | Serge, can you announce how to take public comment? |
| 00:16:14.43 | Vicki Nichols | Of course. Video or audio public comment participation is limited to two minutes per speaker. If you would like to make a comment. Please raise your hand in the Zoom application and you will be called upon when it's your time to speak. To raise your hand from a phone, press start now and each speaker will be notified when the turn as allowed. Madam Mayor, it does not appear as we have any hints |
| 00:16:39.27 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, we'll close public comment, and I'll take either comments or a motion from the council on the meeting minutes. MAKE A MOTION TO MAKE A MOTION |
| 00:16:47.98 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 00:16:48.02 | Janelle Kilman | the minutes. Second. THE FAMILY. Can you go ahead and call the roll? |
| 00:16:53.56 | Vicki Nichols | Council Member Saviensky. Yes. of everything that wants. |
| 00:16:57.15 | Janelle Kilman | Yes. |
| 00:16:58.03 | Vicki Nichols | Council member Hawkins. |
| 00:16:59.63 | Janelle Kilman | Yes. |
| 00:17:00.45 | Vicki Nichols | Mayor Blarstein. |
| 00:17:02.08 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 00:17:02.10 | Vicki Nichols | Yes. Mayor County. |
| 00:17:03.77 | Janelle Kilman | Yes. |
| 00:17:05.10 | Vicki Nichols | I'm going to pass it. |
| 00:17:06.37 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you very much. Item three is the consent calendar. So matters listed under the consent calendar are considered routine and uncontroversial, require no discussion, are expected to have unanimous council support. It may be enacted by the council in one motion that we know 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. So tonight we do have nine items on the consent calendar. Item 3A, proposed license agreement with Associator Center for the Arts. Item three B, South Dakota Police Department of Crime and Tract-Up Report calendar year 2022, first quarter. Item 3C, the Treasurer's Report Q3. M3D adopt resolution authorizing the city manager to execute an agreement with ABAG for a plan grant to develop the Bridgeway Bay trail bike lane design. 3e accept and file the staff report on the status of modifying municipal code chapter 12.16 to prohibit the use of gasoline powered landscape equipment. Item 3F, adopt resolution to continue to conduct the city's council and all other city board commission committee meetings remotely due to health and safety concerns of the public. Item 3G, renewal of emergency declaration related to activities at and surrounding ownership park. Item 3H, receive and file the 2021 annual housing element progress report. and M3I, the memo chart of account changes. We'll go ahead and open public comment on the consent calendar. |
| 00:18:39.06 | Vicki Nichols | Madam Mayor, I see no heads raised for this particular item. |
| 00:18:42.94 | Janelle Kilman | Okay then, then we'll bring it back. I ask council members for either comments or a motion to approve the agenda. If there's no comments, I'll make a motion. |
| 00:18:51.97 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 00:18:52.02 | Janelle Kilman | OF THE CONSENT HALF. |
| 00:18:52.97 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 00:18:53.04 | Janelle Kilman | Yeah. |
| 00:18:54.86 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 00:18:54.88 | Janelle Kilman | That's right. |
| 00:18:54.94 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 00:18:54.96 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 00:18:54.98 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 00:18:55.03 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 00:18:55.35 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 00:18:55.68 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 00:18:55.77 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 00:18:55.80 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 00:18:56.51 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 00:18:57.02 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 00:18:57.07 | Janelle Kilman | Can you go ahead and call the roll, please? |
| 00:19:01.47 | Vicki Nichols | and some members of yes king. Thank you. |
| 00:19:02.76 | Janelle Kilman | Thanks. |
| 00:19:03.08 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. as a miracle they were. Yes. Council member. Yeah. |
| 00:19:10.01 | Julie Vieira | Bye. |
| 00:19:10.03 | Vicki Nichols | Yes. Vice Mayor Blavstein. |
| 00:19:12.34 | Julie Vieira | Yes. |
| 00:19:13.03 | Vicki Nichols | they are coming. Thank you. |
| 00:19:14.45 | Julie Vieira | you |
| 00:19:14.53 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. Mention passes. |
| 00:19:16.88 | Janelle Kilman | Great, thank you. Item four, public hearing items. There are no public hearing items. So we'll move on to item five. and we in fact have two business items tonight. Item 5A is to adopt a resolution approving the proposed parklet and outdoor dining program, and we will take a staff report from Director McGowan, our Public Works Director. |
| 00:19:40.12 | Janelle Kilman | Welcome, Kevin. |
| 00:19:40.69 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 00:19:41.72 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 00:19:41.74 | Chris Zapata | Good evening, Mayor and good evening, members of the City Council. um thank you for letting me speak this evening item 5a before you this evening relates to moving forward with the proposed outdoor dining and parklet program here in Sausalito. Sorry, let me angle my camera a little bit. Excuse me about that. Several key members of the community have donated their time. as well as their wisdom, thank goodness, to participating in a working group to develop the program for Sausalito for outdoor dining and parklets. For Planning Commissioner Chair, Christine Christine Fuller. Our Planning Commissioner Jeffrey Luxembourg, Morgan Pierce, who is the president of the Saucy-Le-Beautiful, have all donated their time and will be speaking this evening for a presentation that I'm hoping are... assistant engineer Ali Iqbal can bring up on the screen momentarily. So Ali is going to be leading us through the presentation initially and then hopefully we'll have our members of the working group step in as well to handle some of the questions. So many thanks to these folks for stepping up and working so hard on this particular issue. It's not easy to understand all the different aspects. So with that, I'd like to turn it over to Ali to walk us through some of the presentations. |
| 00:21:05.61 | Ali | Let me share my screen. I wanted Christina Feller to start us off with a little history of where we are. |
| 00:21:19.16 | Christine Fuller | Great. Thank you, Ali. If we could put the PowerPoint up, there we go. Good evening, Mayor Kelman and the city council members. Thank you for putting this on the agenda this evening for us to walk you through a proposed parklet and outdoor dining programs. If we can move on to the next slide. I just wanted to walk you through a timeline of how this whole program came about. This originally started with an emergency services order based on COVID-19 and the need for outdoor dining and social distancing and has really developed into more than that and part of the overall streetscape and landscape of our city. Back in June of last year, the Planning Commission did put together a task force just to benchmark parklet programs and then in October of last year the City Council requested a the community development department and the department of public works to work together with planning commission to set some standards for permanent parklets as part of our ongoing and permanent landscape and in essence replacing any sort of emergency order. One of the reasons, just as a side note, that I am starting this presentation here is our community development department staff is not available, those that worked on this, to me. So I appreciate. being able to step in to assist with that. On March 11th, we issued a 45 page document to the city council and the city manager that outlined a very comprehensive program. And if we can go to the next slide. just to refresh everyone's memory, what our actual scope was and what that 45 page document really included. we were tasked with developing guidelines that would not only create more of a standardized parklet program, but that also included the consideration for outdoor dining. Outdoor dining is already a ministerial approval and there's a minor use permit involved in that in the city. But how do you take some of those existing provisions, new provisions for parklets, put those together, and standardize this for a fast-tracked ministerial approval for parklets and outdoor dining? And that's really a lot of what we were tasked with. In addition to that, we looked throughout Sausalito in a number of different neighborhoods, both where existing parklets reside now but also opportunities for future parklet locations as well. We came up with eight different areas that we call sort of neighborhoods where parklets would be appropriate and acceptable And some of the things we looked at for that, of course, was safety, both for pedestrians or bicyclists, for vehicles, and for, for those enjoying the outdoor dining. We looked at any sort of impacts that these parklets might have in any of those areas. and ultimately came up with not just sort of a design template, if you will, um we came up with an application process a checklist we beta tested this with existing parklets and we're look we looked at the comprehensive sort of governance of of how this would relate to both our existing Sausalito municipal code and ordinances and what we might have to do to to um perhaps amend those. We'll get into a little bit more detail later, but if we can go to the next slide. I think Director McGowan already mentioned those that were involved here. Of course, a lot of the work also came on the heels of a survey that the city Issued. and also a town hall outreach that the city did as well, including the parklet benchmarking task force and those findings. And together, this team put together what you see in front of you now, which is the 45 page document. And then if we could just go to the next slide, I wanted to orientate you again to exactly what we're looking for. This is just a highlight. Of course, there's more in your staff report. But ultimately what we're asking the city council this evening is to approve or amend this program that we've put in front of you And the idea would be to replace the existing city emergency directive. which I believe you extended the deadline for that once so we could get something like this in place. assuming that you approve it or we incorporate any recommended amendments to the program. We would also ask that you direct staff to amend the Sausalito Municipal Code as required. There are references to the municipal code throughout the document. we would, ask that you give notice to the existing parklets to bring their parklets into conformance and provide a deadline to do that. Again, we've already beta tested the existing parklets and we'll get into a little bit more detail there. certainly collect fees and then retire the existing parklet program and fee waiver that you have currently in place now I wanted to hand it over to Commissioner Luxembourg at this point to maybe go through a little bit more of the detail with you about some of the requirements that we've identified in the program. Mr. Luxenberg? |
| 00:27:09.63 | Jeffrey Luxembourg | Thank you, Chair Fowler. This slide shows one of the parklets in Sausalito. Parklets are basically small public sidewalk extensions that go into the street drainage using parking stalls that could be both active and passive. Ali, next slide. |
| 00:27:26.39 | Paul Walton | Bye. |
| 00:27:29.63 | Jeffrey Luxembourg | So we also looked at outdoor dining or sidewalk dining or outdoor retail, and that's located on the sidewalk between the curb and the building facade. typically adjacent to the building. For the purposes of the program we're proposing, we're recommending simple outdoor dining or display, which is a few chairs and tables next to the building to be part of a ministerial program. More elaborate outdoor dining is currently allowed through the Sausalito Municipal Code, either a conditional use permit or a minor use permit. And we recommend keeping that process for anything elaborate. But in order to help businesses, the simple approach of a few tables and chairs will go through a ministerial approach. NEXT SLIDE. The comprehensive program that's shown in attachment to your staff report talks about a number of aspects. There are maps that show where we're suggesting park groups could possibly be located basically in the commercial zoning districts of the city. The intent of the parklets of this program would be that they would be ministerially approved provided specific requirements in that. The guidelines we have developed are based on benchmarks, based on other things we've seen in other communities, but we've adjusted it for the specific conditions in Sausalito. In addition to the basic requirements, we've also defined some design elements and amenities. And as mentioned in the previous slide, we recommend the ministerial program for simple outdoor dining. of three tables and chairs, as long as a five foot new clear sidewalk is maintained. Later in the presentation, Ali will touch on fees and proposed permit application process. Now we'll go to the next slide. So what are some of the basic requirements that we're talking about? As attachment two shows, the requirements cover a range of areas, including street and sidewalk curb interface, drainage and utilities, platform design, sight lines for traffic safety and circulation issues. A key requirement is maintaining a five foot sidewalk clearance. Also ABA compliance must be maintained. The applicant is required to ensure maintenance a street maintenance deposit is being recommended to be paid prior to an issuance of a program. A safety barrier around the parklets is required. It must be from a DPW approved list of materials. The parklet must ensure visibility for passing the traffic and pedestrians and bicyclists did not create a visual barrier. As far as amenities, the proposed program also provides requirements if certain amenities are included. it provides uh requires airflow if you're going to put a cover on the parklet a cover is not required but if there is a cover it must be a certain clearance as far as the height and also an adequate airflow we are encouraging heating but it's not a requirement but if heating is provided we have certain safety fire safety requirements that are defined signage is limited to six square feet uh we're suggested a requirement of 12 square feet of landscape per parking stall with drought tolerant and native cans for ease of maintenance the landscape plan is required as part of the permit application Writing is allowed and encouraged and the proposed program provides specific requirements but most of those are related to safety. And the program also includes specifications regarding railing materials, both for safety and design. I'll go to the next slide. And this is just one of the illustrations that we provided. There are three of these in your attachment number two. This one is for a parallel parklet using parallel parking spaces. We have one for perpendicular or angled parking, and we have one for outdoor dining. And the illustrations help visualize what the specific requirements are. At this point in the hour, I'm going to turn it over to you. Thank you. |
| 00:31:55.44 | Ali | Yes, so Christina mentioned earlier that we had beta tested a few of the sites that were existing just to see how they stacked up in terms of drainage. maintenance, general non-compliance to the requirements that we're setting forth in the proposal. And then how How difficult would it be from to convert an existing parklet to one of these new permanent parklets. So you can see we did some measurements. And then here, I'll go in a clockwise order, but you can see on the top left, that was a drainage issue. After a big storm, This was a parkland. It's flooded. You can see here at the top You can see my mouse, that's a storm drain. I spared you the details, but that was full of food and wrappers and debris. It was clogged, it was not in the low spot You know, the low spot would have been closer to here. which would have been a more effective spot to drain the parklet. So this is one thing that we looked at. Another one is, This middle slide with the barrels You can see that this really constricts the walkway area. We feel that these barrels should have been more into the parklet area. because if the barrels are into the sidewalk, and you're displaying, you have a display table that really constricts that area So that's another thing that we looked at that could be refined over on the right side. You know, they did the right thing by putting in two Two drains. But you can see that the there's leaves and there's debris in the way. We'd ask the parklet owners to clear those, maintain those, And then there's one on the bottom. for specifically for sidewalk dining These would not be acceptable. We would like these to be a two person table up along the front edge of the building You know, if these two gentlemen decided to get up and leave, or if there was a server, you know, pedestrians that are trying to walk through would likely have to go into the street to bypass this area. And that's just not acceptable and it's a safety issue. Um, And then this last one. I think Christina and Jeffrey and I are still figuring out what this is. or who this was for. This is a clear violation and... Yeah. |
| 00:34:40.06 | Ali | So in terms of application process, in the 45 page document that Christina had, MENTIONED. specifically in attachment three. It breaks out into like six or seven steps of what an applicant would need to do, you know, submit the encroachment permit, They need to include plans, you know, show the utilities, you know, if there's a power hydrant in the way, if there's colored curbs or there are manholes, like we would wanna know that. I'm not sure. We'd wanna ensure that it's ADA compliant. Morgan from the Sustainable from, also lead us to stay in the sustainable, Thank you. |
| 00:35:23.21 | Unknown | present at all. |
| 00:35:23.48 | Ali | Thank you. You've been able beautiful Marin, beautiful Where is he from? |
| 00:35:30.64 | Morgan Pierce | Sweet, oh beautiful. |
| 00:35:30.92 | Ali | I'm going to go. This is also beautiful. So he came up with a lot of materials and colors that would be acceptable for Parkwoods. Um, So once the applicant submits the application and these plans, Staff would determine its completeness. We take the payment, we'd make sure that it's insured. Each of the divisions would review it including Southern Marin Fire, Um, I think it would be CDD that will issue the permit and then DPW and probably CDD. and likely fire moment, Southern fire, would do the site inspection. Uh. So going full circle with what Christina was saying, we'd like to ask for you to approve or amend this program. Amend this also to municipal code and to Um, making this into a fast track and amend the serial process. And, give a deadline and provide notice to the parklets Currently in our report, it states that December 2023 is when they would expire. We asked to collect fees, ironically next month, is when the fee waiver ends. And then lastly, retire the existing program and the fee waiver. |
| 00:36:56.21 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 00:36:56.26 | Ali | Thank you, Ali. |
| 00:36:56.38 | Chris Zapata | Any questions? Thank you, Ali. This is Kevin again. A couple other things to add for the council as well. And to kind of detail a couple of the next steps as well. There are several sections of the municipal code that need to be modified or addressed. And a lot of these are the planning code. I'm going to call some of them out just for reference. You know, Title 10 in our municipal code, as well as specific sections such as 10.44.20, which has sidewalk dining. We also need to take a look at Section 10.56 related to encroachment permits. So we do have a couple different sections to take a look at. In our next steps, we're anticipating to have staff take a look at what language to add or subtract from some of these sections. We'd like to bring that to the Planning Commission for their review and their recommendations for the next steps. And then after that, also bring it to back to the city council in order to I'll move forward with an ordinance, the first reading and the second reading as well. We also have a timing issue here that we have to address. So a lot of moving parts at this point in time. So before I turn it back over to you and your questions, I do wanna thank again, the members of the working group. So Christine Feller, Jeffrey Luxenberg, thank you so much for your efforts. And we really appreciate all your hard work, including staff, Ali, for stepping in for probably an item that he might not be as familiar with. And hopefully this has been a good learning experience as well. Thank you. |
| 00:38:51.28 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you, Kevin. And I just want to give a huge Thank you. This is a heavy, heavy lift. And that was a massive report. So Christina, Chair Feller, and Jeffrey, really outstanding work. And huge thank you also to Morgan Pierce, formerly of the Planning Commission and now with Sassana Beautiful. This is a great example of what our volunteers can do for us. And I was really, really impressed to see the work product. Ali, I know that you were fundamental in executing on this. So thank you enormously for your work and guidance and Kevin for your leadership here as well. So I think I covered everybody, but thank you guys really sincerely. So let's, I'm sure council has questions. Let's go with councilman Cleveland Knowles and then the vice mayor. And Kevin, would you mind taking down your screen share? Thank you, Mayor. |
| 00:39:41.97 | Morgan Pierce | Yes, thank you very much to the working group. I think there's a lot of good technical work here on the aesthetics and the engineering and the permit requirements, right? I'm very confused, however, about what is ministerial under this program and what will still go through the planning commission. review process and the planning commission review process is what really slowed down the advancement of parklets prior to the pandemic So I heard Commissioner Luxembourg say that only outdoor dining would be ministerial. THAT I'M And that seems to be what was also said in the report that we got. I'm going to play. It seems to indicate that only that would be a ministerial permit, but then on slide 13, with it seems to be that staff would do permit issuance. And I think like this is the crux of the matter for me is how what parklets are we going to let go forward? You know, there's a lot of good criteria in here I think I've got some more comments on the criteria, but, um, Can I just understand what the recommendation is? And then maybe we can discuss it more clearly at the council level. |
| 00:41:06.95 | Christine Fuller | Why don't I try to field that question to start with, and thank you for asking it, because this is probably the most important, I agree and I will start with that the remit that this working group received from the city council was to fast track parklets. And therefore we are recommending a ministerial approval by staff to fast track this and that's why the checklists are in this program. and why the criteria and general requirements are laid out so specifically. In the event that an owner or a business owner wants to deviate from what this proposed program is and the requirements within that would kick into a normal design review process that may or may not rise to the level of planning commission but more than likely would. I, as the chair of the planning commission, I'm not in favor of all these things coming to the planning commission either. It is best approved. with clear definitions of what this program is through a ministerial and staff approval. |
| 00:42:19.92 | Morgan Pierce | Okay, great. I'm really glad to hear that. But where, so where's the checklist? |
| 00:42:24.70 | Christine Fuller | So the checklist, I believe I'm just going to look on my screen here. I think it's. |
| 00:42:28.12 | Morgan Pierce | The only thing I saw is page 11 and 12. |
| 00:42:31.82 | Christine Fuller | So I think it's attachment three. I'm just opening it up myself here so I can give you the exact, it's one of the attachments that comes with the general requirements as well. |
| 00:42:42.91 | Morgan Pierce | And collection three is the application. |
| 00:42:46.35 | Christine Fuller | Let me just move to it. Give me just a moment here on my screen, if you don't mind. Okay. So section seven is the permit process that walks somebody through the procedure, the application and the checklists. If we go to attachment three, you have the parklet application package, encroachment permit and license agreement. There's more information in there. to help with that whole permit process. |
| 00:43:14.87 | Paul Walton | Bye. |
| 00:43:14.90 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:43:15.00 | Paul Walton | you |
| 00:43:17.45 | Christine Fuller | And within the body of the document, we go through the exact requirements in section four. which is the parklet design elements and amenities. That's where it goes through canopy cover, uh it goes through the lighting the heating all the elements that commissioner luxembourg had mentioned and what those requirements are there's also some photographs in there and some I'll call them example boards, if you will, to help demonstrate what types of barriers we're talking about, what types of materials, and so on. |
| 00:43:56.80 | Morgan Pierce | Okay, so if you meet all those requirements and you meet the general requirements in Section 3, some of which are I have to say kind of subjective, but if you meet those and to the satisfaction of the zoning administrator, then you get your permit. Correct. And is there a proposed appeal or is that the end of the process? |
| 00:44:18.76 | Christine Fuller | There typically aren't appeals on staff permits so we we would not anticipate one here. |
| 00:44:28.41 | Morgan Pierce | Okay, the current municipal code does allow for appeals. So I've just, it was a little hard to review without the proposed municipal code amendments to understand exactly how this would work, but. |
| 00:44:39.85 | Christine Fuller | Yeah. |
| 00:44:40.24 | Morgan Pierce | So we're recommending no approval. |
| 00:44:43.73 | Christine Fuller | We're recommending no appeal. And just as a side note, again, there are references in the document to the actual sections of the existing Sausalito Municipal Code that we're trying to connect with. We felt it was premature to put amendments together or proposed amendments, I should say to the municipal code, unless we understood that this was, approved or favored by the city council with possibly some amendments. So that's why we're recommending, if you do approve the program, that You also with that approval direct staff, to revise or update those municipal codes accordingly. |
| 00:45:27.84 | Morgan Pierce | Okay, great. That definitely answers a majority of my questions. The second question I had is about the outreach done to the business community. I think we had in your there was at least one public forum So can you describe I assume that working group meetings were public, but what other public outreach was done? |
| 00:45:51.72 | Christine Fuller | No, the working group meetings were not public. It was a working group to technically put this together. There had been a town hall and surveys done prior to the working group. and in both our communications to city council last year and this year prior to submitting we did mention, if you want to do a public outreach we're fine with that, but we need your, that would need to be hosted by the city council. since we are working on your behalf to do this. we did not get direction. |
| 00:46:26.50 | Morgan Pierce | Okay, I'm sorry, the direction on attachment one was to have at least one public forum, but. In any case, so that's fine. We haven't done that. code amendments. Yeah. I am concerned about getting input on these. proposed models from the from the people that will actually be building. Thank you. Okay, that's right. And then I did have a bunch of questions on on 11 and 12, sorry to the other council members for monopolizing time here, but on my park art requirements. Um, THEIR, UH, is a section that says that they shall not be located where there's a color curve zone. And the only arclet that I think we approved through the planning commission in town did use yellow. zone area. in front of Angelina I'm Bridgeway. So I'm wondering where that came from. requirement came from. |
| 00:47:35.60 | Christine Fuller | Well, the requirement that we have for this proposed program going forward and forgive me, I wasn't part of the Angeleno, but I know it predated this emergency directive at this time. I'm sorry. we don't, we're not advocating that any parklet go in a loading zone or near a fire hydrant or any area that would otherwise be, you know, colored curve for like a no parking zone. Those are all colored curbs. |
| 00:48:05.05 | Paul Walton | No. |
| 00:48:08.32 | Christine Fuller | for a reason and generally they're due to traffic circulation, public safety, crosswalks perhaps, you know things of that kind. So we would not advocate putting them in any new spot that had a color curve. |
| 00:48:25.57 | Morgan Pierce | Okay, well maybe we can discuss that. I definitely think that yellow, I mean, I just, in front of most businesses in town, loading zones. So it will be hard to locate parklets if we have a complete I mean, I can see retaining is efficient. learning space, et cetera, but having an absolute ambition, I'm not sure that would be workable. And then I guess my last comment before I turn it over to others. is about the speed limit. I think most of Bridgewater is I guess this is a question maybe Ali could answer this. Does Bridgeway turn to 30 or 25 when you're are coming south from Napa Dunkey Park. because otherwise this prohibits on anything more than 25 miles an hour. |
| 00:49:26.22 | Morgan Pierce | puts it on a case-by-case basis which I puts it on a case-by-case |
| 00:49:28.58 | Ali | It puts it on a case by case. I think we're trying to limit it to those areas that were 25 miles per hour on land. |
| 00:49:35.35 | Morgan Pierce | And where does that start on Bridger? |
| 00:49:41.07 | Ali | I don't know. Kevin, do you know? I want to say at least at Johnson Street, if not sooner, |
| 00:49:46.03 | Chris Zapata | Thank you. |
| 00:49:46.60 | Ali | Thank you. |
| 00:49:46.62 | Chris Zapata | Let us double check on that. |
| 00:49:48.80 | Morgan Pierce | Okay, and I guess my only comment there is it says on a case by case basis. And if that's case by case with the zoning administrator, I guess I'd be fine with that. But if it's taking it out of the ministerial box, then when most of Bridgeway is in that zone, then that might be. only do a minute, but anyway, yeah, it would be helpful to know what that is. All right, I'll stop for now. Thank you very much and thanks for all the work. Thank you, Mayor, Council Member. |
| 00:50:17.25 | Unknown | Thank you very much for the amount of work put into this presentation. I really appreciate the time and the work product is really impressive. I can see that you've spent a lot of hours pulling this together with 45 pages on recommendations. I wanted to ask a few questions about the fees. So the proposed fees, the application fee is pretty straightforward. There's on the fee issues, I'm sure that it's because there were great examples from other communities, but the Los Angeles and Culver City sewer 641 perceived fee, is that something that's gonna apply here or. Is there a sewer fee perceived and could you clarify? |
| 00:50:59.91 | Ali | Well, we looked at different municipalities to see what fees that they were associating with parklands. you And we included this because it made sense. If you're gonna, if the restaurant is gonna add you know, 20 more seeds. Those 20 seats are going to use the restroom. that should be that they should pay for that impact. Um, So that's where that came from. |
| 00:51:27.26 | Unknown | So if you have 20 seats, that's an additional $12,000 plus that you have to pay per seat as a restaurant. |
| 00:51:33.71 | Ali | in LA and Culver City. |
| 00:51:36.47 | Unknown | So I mean, we're not proposing that, or that was as an example. |
| 00:51:36.49 | Ali | Thank you. But that's an on. |
| 00:51:41.47 | Ali | That's an example what number we have. I haven't come up with the number of what Sausalito would charge. |
| 00:51:48.09 | Unknown | Okay. Yeah, cause that seems like a large fee for some of our restaurants considering, but that's good to know. And then the, rental fee, all the kind of straightforward, but then the meter parking space fee, which is, is it $1,000 per space? per year for five years. So you could be paying $10,000 for two spaces for five years. Is that the plan? |
| 00:52:12.03 | Ali | That was the plan because we'd be losing revenue. That's why we thought we could make that up. |
| 00:52:16.01 | Unknown | So when we're beginning revenue on the additional seats of the sales tax from the additional seats for people coming in, I'm just thinking of the business burden and how we might balance this given the cost. |
| 00:52:21.75 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:52:21.87 | Ali | Interesting. |
| 00:52:22.31 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:52:22.36 | Ali | to the next episode. |
| 00:52:22.43 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:52:26.54 | Ali | Sure, yeah. That's a good outside the box thing. |
| 00:52:29.78 | Unknown | And then is the, Is that, do we know for sure that it's a thousand dollars roughly per meter? That's what we're per meter spot. Thank you. |
| 00:52:37.04 | Ali | We had, preliminary discussions with Elliot, And I think that's where that number came from. |
| 00:52:45.76 | Unknown | Okay, but we'll be open to seeing like if the sales tax is X amount, then that fee is waived or something. Sure, absolutely. Correct. |
| 00:52:51.74 | Christine Fuller | Right. |
| 00:52:52.60 | Unknown | Go ahead, Christina, I'd love to hear your thoughts on that. |
| 00:52:52.67 | Christine Fuller | like, I'm going to go. I just want to maybe add a little bit of it just to give a little perspective on how we were coming up with the fees. I wasn't part of all the discussions about the fees but we did benchmark the different categories of fees and fee recovery, certainly. We also engaged with the Chamber of Commerce here just to get some understanding about the businesses. And then CDD staff did coordinate with the city's director of finance about this as well. And so we were trying to triangulate how, how to assess fees. And I think the questions are, are. are really good and this is probably maybe the most important hard that we need to take direction from the city council on. And you're right, there's always gonna be offsets okay, there's lost revenues certainly for the meter, but there could be a gain here and there. And that's really why we were trying to engage with the department of the, you know, your finance director. to really figure out the best way to assess these. Because I don't think any of us pretend to be the expert in that other than being able to benchmark from other jurisdictions. Thank you. |
| 00:54:09.84 | Unknown | Did we, did you, when you said you engage with the chamber, did you mention the metering fee or was it just more generally, what do you think is an approachable fee for a business to pay for the parklets? |
| 00:54:09.87 | Christine Fuller | Did we, did you, when you said you, |
| 00:54:19.20 | Christine Fuller | It was really the latter. |
| 00:54:21.02 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:54:21.55 | Christine Fuller | Yeah. And was that like, |
| 00:54:22.49 | Unknown | Was that like, because looking at this, assuming we don't have a 641 per seat fee which is it's kind of a lot for some of the businesses here at this stage given what they're paying in that etc like it would end up costing in the ballpark of about $5,000 to go through the full process of issuing the parklet. That's what you see as a essentially. I mean, I didn't do all the math. I'm just looking at it from on top of it. Yeah. And would you recommend, because you looked at so many, what so many other cities are doing, are there some, for instance, when we did the single use plastics program, there's options for exemptions or for grants. Is that something that the working group considered? |
| 00:55:07.92 | Christine Fuller | We did not consider that, no. |
| 00:55:09.91 | Unknown | Okay. Okay. Yeah. I mean, I think I, there's obviously a lot of research that went into what you were thinking about for the fees. I just want to make sure it's something that's approachable for our businesses. So I would love to, if we, as we go back to the conditions here, more from. chamber too about that but otherwise that was my main question it looks like you put a lot into the the planning and the design consideration. So that's the end of my questions. |
| 00:55:32.12 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council Member Hoffman. And actually, Councilman Hoffman, I see that Kevin McGowan has his hand up. Perhaps he has a response to prior questions. So, Director McGowan, do you want to attend him? |
| 00:55:43.80 | Chris Zapata | Yes, I only wanted to chime in and just mention to council member Cleveland-Mill's question. It's 20 miles per hour from Napa street all the way through. And even if we do the speed as you get to the second street. Sorry about that. |
| 00:56:00.55 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 00:56:00.64 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 00:56:00.65 | Unknown | you |
| 00:56:00.84 | Chris Zapata | you |
| 00:56:01.41 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you, Dr. McGowan. All right, over to you, Councilman Hoffman. Thanks, actually, yeah, I mean that the fees were something that I was looking at too. and the correlation between the loss of parking revenue. And we've done that in the past. And I feel like we did that when this first came up, because that was something we always looked at whenever talking about losing parking spaces. I think, or the vice mayor did a nice job of articulating you know the view from the businesses and the cost benefit analysis of that but also the balance is always the loss of use of a public asset, right? Of a parking spot, a public parking spot that anybody can park at and you're converting that to private use. And so And also keeping in mind that they, you know, the, the, that's not maybe building something out, but they're, they're also expanding their, square footage of their restaurant and I, I would be interested in knowing that, right? Like what's the rough, what's the rough loss of revenue to the city? And is that offset by you know by the you know, by the tax firm, from the restaurant, but I think we've done that now since the past and I don't think that part of it moves the dial. I think we're back to the public you know private benefit of converting that from a public parking spot and the use of other businesses frankly so anytime squeeze a balloon on parking in Sausalito, someone's going to lose the benefit of that space and that's something that we always balance as well so That's something that I think needs to be called out in as we move forward and we address the number of parklets and where they are and also the cost for the public from the loss of that benefit. And the other thing I think we talked about before was, I mean, this is a simple thing, right? but outlines if you're going to have sidewalk tables like So I think we need to have an outline of that so that it's really easily And I mean, I know that's a small thing, but it will save us a lot of a lot of consternation later about whether or not someone's outside the safety zone of where their tables are supposed to be. And that's just for the sidewalk. I think those are my two biggest concerns. And also, you know, just to thank you for the tremendous effort from you know, the planning commissioners, the chair Feller and you know, public works guys. Gosh, we give you guys huge, huge things to do. I really appreciate the lift on this and helping us bring this to a close. So great work, you guys. I really appreciate it. I know we all do. |
| 00:58:49.62 | Morgan Pierce | than we all do. |
| 00:58:51.45 | Janelle Kilman | THANK YOU. Yeah, truly tremendous. Okay, I will go to Councilor Sobieski and then I will turn on. |
| 00:58:58.41 | Unknown | Thank you very much and thanks for all the work done in this by volunteers primarily. over a long period of time. And, uh, I know what that's like. And so thank you for all the work. data in particular i'm just curious if you could just address one I know we talked about this a year ago, One path forward was, to actually come up with AND I WANTED TO BE A HANDFUL OF designs, maybe even parklets that had been built here in Sausalito. And if not here in Sausalito, then perhaps on very similar curves in San Francisco or in Mark Spurrier. whatever we thought the best parklets were and actually pull. together. five or six actual designs whether they're four by fours or two by fours, whether they use set screws or nickel bladed screws. and actually have those as pre-canned. designs. that were available for ministerial approval. subject to the sign-offs of the various departments that you were outlined in your methodology. so that a business that they so chose would not have to interpret set of designs or get a go through the design process interacting with your objective design but instead could pull something off the shelf. And I see in the staff report as nearly as I can tell, a earnest effort to try to come up with a set of design criteria and Some solutions. beginnings of a template design, but certainly not, as far as I can tell, unless I missed the attachment. uh, um, the six designs that we talked about. And I am curious. If that was a deliberate choice, if that is still something that we could ask, there to be done. Thank you. And I see that. Commissioner Luxenberger is in too. So that's my main question, please. |
| 01:00:53.86 | Christine Fuller | Thank you for asking the question. I do recall the conversation. We tried Thank you. we started out with the idea, okay, maybe we could come up with three templates you know there there's several different um parking configurations here in Sausalito, whether it's parallel, whether it's on an angle, you name it. Actually, when you start to walk around and look at this stuff, as we did, you realize that there are a lot of irregular areas and situations for parklets, believe it or not. And so. the template was not really going to work from being a full sort of off the shelf if you will if i can use that parklet that you could just go construct. So what we did instead to create a template was to create the diagrams that you see in the proposed program, where the sizes are all set. the how a business wants to finish it, whether it be red trim or green trim, I'm oversimplifying of course, what kind of seating configuration they would like to use in their parklet that is so connected to the actual business that we felt it was an overreach to be too prescriptive with what that was. And a lot of branding is associated with different, different businesses. And we felt that that perhaps was really outside of the remit. spirit of it, let's say. than what we put together. So the actual templates that you see are a little different than what you and I had originally spoken about. But they are standardized in terms of their size and how they interface with a sidewalk and how they interface with a business. So from that standpoint, they actually are templates. How someone finishes it is a little bit different. I know Commissioner Luxenberg had his hand up too. I don't know if you want to add to that. |
| 01:03:06.97 | Jeffrey Luxembourg | Yeah, if I could, we did start with the idea that we would have, as Christina said, three templates. And then as we got into this, we realized that we wanted to make this as easy as possible. We started with a ministerial approach. There was a question earlier. This was always intended to be a ministerial approach for power plants. and we wanted to make it easy for the businesses and we found that if we had templates given the unique nature of almost every site in Sausalito they might not be able to fit it in that particular location and therefore they couldn't do one of the standard ones and they were going to make it harder on them so instead we came up with specific guidelines mostly related to safety and that type of thing there has to be a you know certain clearance uh visibility those kinds of things and then just doing an off the shelf uh thing was not going to work for for most of the areas and then we felt that people would feel like if they couldn't do that there was going to be a longer process So instead we came up with just very specific rules that Public Works and CDD can sign off on with the application and things could go as fast as possible. So that was the intent here. And again, we tried to do the templates, but it just wasn't working as we did. |
| 01:04:29.97 | Unknown | God for the Lord. Thank you for that. If I might just ask a follow-up question on that. I'm just putting it on my skeptics hat. Was there an architect involved in in this? investigation about having a generic temple. |
| 01:04:45.50 | Jeffrey Luxembourg | Morgan Pierce from Sausler, beautiful as an opportunity. |
| 01:04:50.28 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 01:04:50.56 | Jeffrey Luxembourg | Thank you. He's not here on this meeting, is he? |
| 01:04:53.21 | Unknown | He was on the screen. Yeah, I'd just love to hear from you, Morgan. able to, the idea of, having templatized approaches that again, it would be complimentary to the more generic objective design standards, Is it possible to have a, an even yet simpler approach for businesses that so chose. to have to pick from a library of THE END OF THE END OF THE canned designs that would then be modestly modified to adapt to say, where or storm drain was, or needing an interface with a curve that's a few inches lower, a few inches higher. |
| 01:05:35.82 | Morgan Pierce | certainly uh and thank you council members and are you able to hear me and see me well thank you very much um and i will essentially reflect on what um my my collaborators uh ali and christina and jeffrey have already made in on um we definitely went into the process looking for the simplest way to um allow business owners to incorporate parklets into their designs However, through our processes, we realized that Saucerito was a very unique community, and there are a lot of distinctive characteristics aligned with each business and each locale in which a parklet might be placed. And while we were tempted to provide some essentially cookie cutter options for them, we felt that the business owners themselves would prefer to apply some unique characteristics to the parklets that they wanted for their properties. And so what we were trying to achieve in the diagrams and language was enough latitude to give them that flexibility to create something distinctive for their property, but at the same time follow a ministerial process that eliminated any discretionary process that would slow down or make it more convoluted than it needed to be. |
| 01:06:54.43 | Unknown | Thanks, Pat Morgan. Sorry to press on the point, but I just wanted to be clear because it's helping me- Certainly. So it sounds like that technically it might be possible to have a generic Parklet. It certainly is. It certainly is. So it is technically possible, but the key was you made a qualitative assessment that want to have individual branding. So just to that point, I mean, was any consideration given or is it a policy choice? to in fact have a more unified sense of an integrated parklet system in town or parklets |
| 01:07:26.17 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 01:07:26.49 | Unknown | All right. |
| 01:07:26.57 | Morgan Pierce | All right. |
| 01:07:26.76 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:07:26.77 | Morgan Pierce | Yeah. |
| 01:07:26.89 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:07:26.91 | Morgan Pierce | I think from a sizing and from a basic regulations of, again, as Jeffrey and Christina and Alia aligned relative to open area and construction and safety and accessibility, obviously we wanted to create a very systematic approach and standardized approach to that. However, as it came to making them personalized for the various properties and business owners, we wanted to leave a little bit more latitude. So we felt like the path we were going down allowed for the both and scenario. Now, granted through this discussion with city council, there's probably some room for some additional refinement in the language, but we definitely felt like a both and approach. was the ideal way to go. Thanks so much and thanks for bearing with me. I just wanted to. |
| 01:08:14.90 | Unknown | Thank you. My other question was... |
| 01:08:15.91 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 01:08:15.97 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. |
| 01:08:20.67 | Unknown | I think Councilor Cleveland-Knowles asked this about outreach to the businesses, I'm not sure. You know, I don't know how many businesses currently have parklets, but has, has, Have these, have today's agenda THIS PROPOSAL. given to the current businesses that have parklets so they know what they're I see Ali shaking his head. So no, it's not going to get into that. Okay. And then, The businesses on Caledonia, right there at the end. If this is approved as written, would they have to modify the parkways that currently go to the edge of the bike lane? |
| 01:09:01.61 | Jeffrey Luxembourg | If I could join in on that, Christina. The ones on Caledonia are approved under sort of a special unique circumstance, which allowed the street to be narrowed and the parklets to be widened. since those already exist uh unless there's a plan to reconfigure the street back to what it is they would not necessarily have to comply with this because that was done under a special circumstance uh and that had there was more room there they took out more than a parking space but uh that would be something that the council would have to consider uh also going back to your other question part of the reason we haven't gone this next step was we wanted to get information from the council before taking it to specific code changes and and how how to carry the next step we wanted to give you a program to look at react react to, and then those things can come from there. That's what's the intent as we, and that's why we did your updates throughout as well. |
| 01:09:45.59 | Paul Walton | All right. |
| 01:10:07.10 | Christine Fuller | Thank you. |
| 01:10:07.69 | Jeffrey Luxembourg | so much. |
| 01:10:08.57 | Christine Fuller | If I can just add one thing, we did beta test. a myriad of different parklets and part of that beta testing did look at Caledonia as well. And, and this program that we're proposing to you tonight would require some minor tweaks to a number of the different parklets but they're so very minor as you saw in some of the photos that Ellie was showing you like move the wine barrels you know, the carclet space so there's enough sidewalk space, you know, things like that. I think the only major issue on Caledonia was issues with drainage and I would let DPW, I would defer to them, but I think that was the only issue with the Caledonia ones. |
| 01:10:53.10 | Unknown | Thank you, Chair Feller. I see if everyone's work. |
| 01:10:55.27 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:10:56.77 | Christine Fuller | Thank you. |
| 01:10:56.78 | Janelle Kilman | Yeah. Thank you everybody. I just have two questions. So I too, like Killsmore Sobieski originally thought, oh, we could have three or four standardized designs and then deploy these throughout town. But I understand having read your excellent report and the constraints there, but I have a mention of a ministerial checklist. And so what I'm interested to know is whether that checklist had been shared with property owners and did they understand it? Because when I read the purpose, I think it was on page three about streamline and stereo, it's awesome. I wanna make sure that the property owner or the business that's trying to comply with that can understand what is being asked of them. And so we all have the benefit of having been on planning commission. So we look at it and we go, I know what that is. Was there any kind of beta testing with that checklist? |
| 01:11:48.07 | Christine Fuller | So the answer is that this working group did not feel it was our place to reach out directly to business owners. We felt that might circumvent the city council that asked for this work to be done. And again, in the communications, the two communications that we issued as updates to the City Council before we issued this proposed program on March 11th, I did identify and ask if you wanted to host an outreach to businesses or the public or another town hall type of situation that you had done previously. And so that's really where we left it. We're happy. to to host that for you. We're happy to participate in it for you. We certainly are also not trying to circumvent the public. We were just really trying to get, the proposal to you. engage, you know, the questions, which I think are all really excellent. and then move forward in the most appropriate way that you see fit. |
| 01:12:53.00 | Janelle Kilman | I appreciate that. I just, uh, Love the emphasis on a ministerial streamlined effort. And then my second question, I very much appreciate page 26 about cost recovery and throughout the document, wanting to benchmark this against costs. As Councilman Huffman brought up, We're of course weighing this against the public benefit and the use of public public spaces for private good. Was there any consideration, and this might be outside the scope of the planning commission, but any consideration to understanding the extension of the business opportunity? So 13, was it $13 a square foot for a parklet, interior parklet space? I'm assuming that's a lot cheaper, or I don't know, is it cheaper than what they pay on their rent? You know, it would be nice to have some type of tracking system from a financial perspective built into this program so that in addition to saying it looks good, we can actually point to financial success to say, and it worked, and this is why we want to do some other things. That might be beyond the scope of what you're trying to do. If you have thoughts on it, I'm open to it. |
| 01:13:56.03 | Christine Fuller | Well, I can start the conversation, but I'm sure my collaborators here have some ideas about it too. But the answer is no, we did not specifically look at that. However, I know CDD did engage with your real estate consultant. And I know that through DPW, we also spoke to Parisi on transportation and circulation and what that meant to roads and things of that kind. But we didn't really take it that far. because honestly, we have to know that we have a viable proposed program here before we really try to get too far into the weeds with with how to benchmark that. CDD staff did also have those conversations with your finance director, and that would be a great way to, you know, how do we set that up? those kind of metrics through your finance department and, and, um, |
| 01:14:50.27 | Paul Walton | THE CITY. |
| 01:14:55.58 | Christine Fuller | And I would say that those are good places to start. But I hope I answered that question. And I don't know, Ali, if you have anything more to add to that or anybody else. |
| 01:15:05.69 | Ali | No, I think that's where we're going with it. I mean, the more you dig into it, we can open up a can of worms if the property value on Caledonia or Bridgeway is more expensive than the one in Marinship. How do you, is $13 fair for one versus another? we're, I rely on Vivian and the finance department to tell us Thank you. More about that. |
| 01:15:30.06 | Janelle Kilman | Yeah, that's fair. Thanks you guys. Any other questions? I'm sorry, I see you, Councilor Cleveneals, go ahead. |
| 01:15:39.00 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:15:39.02 | Morgan Pierce | Yeah, thanks. Yeah, sorry. Questions I forgot. And one was we did have a discussion when we first talked about this, about over concentration. And I didn't see that issue addressed. I don't know if it's going to be an issue. I don't think we have that problem right now. Can you just let us know your thoughts on that? whether you consider that, you know, a number of permits for a neighborhood or, other factors number of permits within x number of spaces of each other, et cetera. |
| 01:16:15.94 | Christine Fuller | It's a very insightful question, and yes, we did discuss it, and it really came up. probably more on Caledonia and that neighborhood as we've defined it in the proposed program than anywhere else. Mainly because it's more narrow in their businesses. You know, it's a double loaded road or street as it's referred to. But again, we did not think that that was part of our remit. And I think it's a perfectly legitimate thing to think about and include. Um, but I'm not sure that we we really have a response for that as part of the program. |
| 01:17:04.51 | Morgan Pierce | Okay, thanks. And then this is really on the weeds, but I think it's important. There's a section about sight lines and parking, distance from the curb, Bye. All right. I'd really love our traffic engineer, David Preece, maybe to work with Ali and others. One of the problems that we have in Sausalito, as everybody knows, is we don't have enough go riding already around our intersections. So, but the way this is written is that there needs to be a parking space and then the parklet. So you can have a big car, And then the carpet. And I don't think that really solves the issue that maybe this committee was trying to resolve of sight lines and safety. that you've discussed in the report. So I would just love someone to take one more look at that and see if it's more like a car length. from the curb, like a parking space length away from the curb, not an actual parking space. because that's not Anyway, I just like what is safe and what provides the best sight line? So anyway, sorry to get down in that. WE NEEDED. And then the last thing I just wanted to make sure I have a hazy memory of our approval of the Caledonia Parklets and whether those were permanent and tied to the emergency or whether those were permanent or they were tied in some way to the emergency. So I don't know if Kevin or our city attorney One, two. whether it California. currently is of commonings. or permanent until we make some other decision. Is that Kevin, do you remember? Thank you. |
| 01:18:42.52 | Chris Zapata | Mm-hmm. Sounds well, it's not permanent at this point in time. These are a pilot project on Caledonia. So we're moving forward with it in that respect. So if the council wants it removed and the street reopened, we can request that to happen. |
| 01:18:59.29 | Morgan Pierce | But it was, I guess going back to, I don't know if it was council member Sobieski's question or who asked this, but they would not be able to apply through this permit process, is that correct? because of the width of the I'm sorry. I would assume don't conform to the |
| 01:19:21.90 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 01:19:21.97 | Chris Zapata | Yes, that is correct because we've closed the southbound lane. So if we want to open up the southbound lane, then we'd have to look at that as a case by the case basis. So you are correct. |
| 01:19:35.74 | Janelle Kilman | OK. Thank you. We'll go to the vice mayor and then we're very flexible with the comments. So just keeping |
| 01:19:44.97 | Unknown | sustainability commission hat on. I have to ask also about heating. and the implications of obviously continuing to use many gas propane heaters. I'm wondering if there was any in any of the other cities that you looked at, because you did look at several, if there were any alternatives or perhaps special discounts given to restaurants that were using alternative types of heating, electric types of heating that might decrease emissions as we're working to mitigate the impacts of climate change. |
| 01:20:16.66 | Christine Fuller | Well, again, let me take the first stab at that and invite anybody else on the working group to add to it. Um, I would say if you look at the other jurisdictions, uh, that, that were benchmarked, uh, last summer, they all had heating. Now some were, you know, electric, some were, you know, the little propane gas tank that's, you know, interchangeable. It just really depended on the, on the business. Um, The other thing to mention that we've seen is that all of a sudden, and you see this a lot in San Francisco, probably because of all the different microclimates. is all of a sudden you're sitting in a, you know, like a trailer box on the, on the, you know, it's fully enclosed on the sidewalk. And I think that sort of defeats the purpose of what this is all about. So I think that we would, you know, strongly encourage us to stay away from that model, the latter that I just mentioned. But you know, if You know, we looked at sustainability with a lot of the products that we have. in terms of the building products and things like that, particularly you know and also drought tolerant plants and things of that kind |
| 01:21:33.53 | Paul Walton | You know what? |
| 01:21:38.15 | Christine Fuller | When it came to heating, it seems to be such is business by business. We also didn't want to be overly punitive to a business by barring one thing or the other. One way to handle that just as a recommendation, and I'm saying this on the fly and not, you know, in collaboration with the rest of the working group is, you can also consider phasing out sort of the propane and more phasing in, but give some grace period for businesses so it's not overly punitive. |
| 01:22:10.40 | Unknown | you Did you see any jurisdictions doing perhaps just a credit to one part of the permitting fee if they use electric rather than propane? |
| 01:22:18.55 | Christine Fuller | I did not see that when we went through the benchmarking task force. I did not see that at all. There was just no mention of that. |
| 01:22:25.74 | Morgan Pierce | Right now. Thank you. |
| 01:22:26.16 | Christine Fuller | Yeah. |
| 01:22:27.36 | Morgan Pierce | Okay. |
| 01:22:27.90 | Christine Fuller | THANK YOU. |
| 01:22:27.92 | Morgan Pierce | Thanks. |
| 01:22:28.39 | Janelle Kilman | the consideration of that. |
| 01:22:29.69 | Christine Fuller | Yeah. |
| 01:22:30.72 | Janelle Kilman | Good question. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Okay, if there are no other questions for the working group here, Then let's go ahead and open up to public comment and Serge, I see several hands raised already. So I'll leave it to you to. Call on these folks. |
| 01:22:43.88 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you Madam Mayor. Julie Vieira, you're being unmuted. I must share your video. |
| 01:22:54.02 | Julie Vieira | Good evening. I just want to. speak on behalf of some of the businesses and answer some questions here this evening. Number one, yes. The committee did call the chamber. In no way did I ever say $1,000 a year was a good trade off for parking space. And I find it ironic that you guys are worried about charging local businesses for parking spaces that they're going to give up When you're talking about getting rid of 17 plus parking spaces in parking lot one So I find that a little bit of a double standard. We're gonna charge our businesses for taking up parking and yet the city. has a proposal in to take away 17 spaces And isn't that income to you guys as well? You guys just gave away $52,000 for free to the Sausalito Art Center. by charging them $1 for that four or five years of four or five months of basically free rent And we're worried about what we're gonna charge the small businesses in town for the parklet. So I think that's a little bit of a double standard there. So, I think that there needs to be some assistance or some help with these businesses. As I'm adding all of this up, These businesses are just coming out of COVID. Yes, we did a lot of these temporary but is there some type of grant program that the city is gonna help the businesses with? Is there some kind of program that can be looked into for grants for the business? We've spent a great deal of time tonight talking about, you know, how the city's gonna recoup their money for the parking, but how are the businesses THE CITY IS GOING TO PUT |
| 01:24:52.03 | Christine Fuller | this large dollar amount after two years of slow business to get their parking in. |
| 01:24:57.97 | Janelle Kilman | I just want you guys to take that into consideration. If we're giving away money, we better give them- |
| 01:25:02.05 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. Thank you very much, Julie. Our next speaker is David Suda. David, you've been unmuted and has to share your video. |
| 01:25:13.38 | David Suda | Good evening City Council. I just think the word David Gert, how are you going on? |
| 01:25:19.45 | Unknown | DAVID GERMANN. How are you going? Thank you. |
| 01:25:22.00 | David Suda | Um, Let's see. |
| 01:25:31.63 | David Suda | Can you hear me now? Yes. I don't know. Yes. OK. So I'd like to thank everybody for their work. I think as council member Susan Cleveland pointed out there's some safety issues with parklets, I'm 100% for these parklets. And, uh, And but I, but I think that the part that's also exacerbated Um, an issue with loading zones in the downtown. and that we need to take a serious look and I'm sorry, Kevin, but we need to... give staff time to really thinking about putting new loading zones downtown. parent, you know, we haven't really looked at it probably for 30 or 40 years. And A lot's changed since then and since we don't have any loading zones along Bridgeway right now, people are just doing whatever they want and it's not a good situation. Thank you. |
| 01:26:29.47 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:26:33.36 | Vicki Nichols | The next speaker is Kevin Carroll. Kevin, you're being unmuted. |
| 01:26:41.63 | Kevin Carroll | Thank you and good evening. I'm going to save the video so I have better bandwidth. Um, Larkspur was dealing with this issue last night. And I actually, I thought what's already been done along Bridgeway really looked good and would enhance Larkspur. So I was out taking pictures today, And I forwarded their public works and code enforcement and city council members and materials for tonight's meeting because I think you've come up with some really great stuff. But the one thing I did notice when I was out today. |
| 01:27:16.66 | Paul Walton | it. |
| 01:27:18.03 | Kevin Carroll | Some of the, tables and chairs of the people that are putting just loose tables and chairs out already were violating this. There was not five feet of room. And this was on a very slow day. what it's gonna be like this weekend. could be a nightmare. And that raises the issue of who's going to enforce these regulations. You know, and it's sometimes it's not the restaurant's fault. It's the customers will move the chairs and tables around that are movable and create a hazardous situation. And the waiter and waitresses are doing their job, they're not paying attention necessarily all the time. And so the question is, who's going to enforce this and how and when you don't want people jamming up 9-1-1 with these kind of calls and most of your code enforcement people only work Monday through Friday. And these problems tend to occur on weekends. So I would suggest possibly signage indicating who to call if you have a complaint. The other thing is I don't think this covers the pre-existing condition which you already have at Copito, where they already have a preexisting sidewalk encroachment and I'm not sure there's five feet there between there wall. a little low wall in the curb. And I've witnessed two accidents already, hit and run to bicyclists at that intersection. It's in an intersection, there is a red zone, |
| 01:28:45.22 | Vicki Nichols | And then your two more have a lapse. Our next speaker is Carolyn Revell. Carolyn, you've been in need. I missed you, sir. Bye. |
| 01:28:58.74 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:28:58.77 | Carolyn Revell | I'm going to go on mute. |
| 01:29:03.90 | Carolyn Revell | I'm thrilled to see the parklet and commend the working group for the time they've put into it. It's very important. and Phil, It seems to me responding to the concern to fast track approvals through the ministerial approach. It seems like this report It addresses many safety concerns, particularly the five foot sidewalk clearance, which is so important as Kevin was saying, concern for safety barriers and visibility, particularly I'm of course interested in the amenities that are suggested, the airflow, they're gonna have anything overhead, at least ensure airflow, but it sounds like you're not encouraging much overhead canopy. the limited signage, the landscape, particularly emphasis on drought tolerant, encouragement of lighting and recommended railing materials And the fact that you have looked at the existing conditions that are pointing out things like the drainage concerns. So I think it's a very thorough piece of work and I'm sure there are modifications that could be made, but I want to say how much I support this work and encourage the council to allow it to be incorporated into the municipal code as appropriate. Thank you. |
| 01:30:14.88 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. |
| 01:30:15.44 | Carolyn Revell | Thank you. |
| 01:30:15.45 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:30:15.74 | Carolyn Revell | Thank you. |
| 01:30:15.77 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:30:15.83 | Carolyn Revell | on. |
| 01:30:16.05 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:30:17.36 | Vicki Nichols | My next speaker is Sandra Bushmaker. Sandra, you've been in meeting. Nice to share your video. |
| 01:30:25.61 | Julie Vieira | Good evening everybody. Good to see you all again. since it seems like we're seeing a lot of each other. I want to commend the working group for the amount of work that they did on this. It's really quite impressive and once again shows the power of working groups. and what can be accomplished rather than the long haul long slog through many of our efforts. I just wanted to comment on not so much on the merits of this program. But I realized that we got into parklets at the beginning of COVID because we needed to be outside and we couldn't be indoors before health and safety reasons. I have a question, a policy question for the council, and I would like to see some discussion on this issue. Council Member Hoffman and Mayor Kelman alluded to all of this and that is the transfer of public land to a private entity. for the private entities use. Now, like I said, I'm not commenting on the merits. It's just a policy decision that you're making that I think needs to have some discussion. And I'd like to hear what the council's policy is on the transfer of public property for private use. Thank you. |
| 01:31:46.21 | Vicki Nichols | Our next speaker is Vicki Nichols. Vicki, if you may need it, Mr. Sherry-Bittie. |
| 01:31:51.79 | Carolyn Revell | Thank you. Hello, Mayor Kelman and council members. I just I want to follow up with Sandra's point and. If this was said, I'm actually driving, I've pulled over. I apologize if you already mentioned this in the overview of the proposals. But these are conditional use permits, as I understand. So if the conditions are not met, In the event there's some lack of cooperation, it could go back to its existing configuration so that it I'm just trying to get clarity that this is no way giving or deeding or doing anything with this private property that's question one And number two, I heard some confusion, and at least for me, not |
| 01:32:37.96 | Julie Vieira | clarity around the talking about the lane bike lane and the last block between |
| 01:32:45.09 | Carolyn Revell | and pine of caledonia i have never heard that that was approved to the contrary we were told that that was a temporary trial trial project that would be reviewed in march of this year it was never reviewed so i just want to make sure that if this has been approved i'd like to know when and how that action was taken and what are the next steps about considering that and evaluating that trial project. Thank you. |
| 01:33:16.61 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. |
| 01:33:16.62 | Janelle Kilman | Thanks. |
| 01:33:17.03 | Vicki Nichols | Thank you. And you have members Yes, sorry, Sergeant Pepp. Madam Mayor, it looks like we don't have any other members of the public that would like to speak. |
| 01:33:26.51 | Janelle Kilman | Okay. So we're gonna be a closed public comment, putting it back up to, Dias. Yeah, go ahead, Councilman Fiddle Mills. |
| 01:33:35.98 | Morgan Pierce | Thanks, ma'am. Thank you to the members of the public that spoke. I think, I mean, kind of what I'm hearing is most of the aesthetic requirements the canopy the lighting most of those are pretty well addressed in the document we don't have a lot of I don't think there's a lot of concerns around those issues. But, um... The things that I would propose that we but I would like to give direction to the owner, really tightening up and clarifying the checklist. And if it's going to be usable, I think this document is, it's really long and it's very complete, but it's not easy. to read. So I sort of think a checklist on the top of it and then each section that has actual requirements might be an easier way for a business to actually understand this. I won't try to reorganize the document right now, but I think just what do you have to do to get a ministerial permit to have a parklet and have that checklist either as an attachment or the document or whatever it is. The second thing, I think there does need to be some additional public outreach, especially to the chamber, to the businesses, around a number of different issues that could happen simultaneously as it goes back to the planning commission. Number three is the fees. I think generally the fees are appropriate. I would suggest phasing in any additional fees related to loss of parking revenue. until we're a little bit more out of the woods on COVID. So I would give at least propose at this point, maybe a year earn their moratorium on that and kind of consider phasing that in at a later time. I really like Council Member Hoffman's idea. I think we talked about this at a couple of meetings about having the tables and chairs that are on the sidewalk. but those really need to have delineated um, zones like there's a table here and two chairs here and that's it um so that we can more clearly enforce I suppose. And then kind of to the broader public policy, I would just say, I have universally heard from citizens, private residents, that they love the transformation of the public right of way parking spaces, which by the way, are also used by private individuals and privatized every time someone parks there. But having those transformed to outdoor livable usable spaces. So I have pretty much heard maybe. a handful of people that are not in favor but overall as a policy matter I think the use of our public right of way for the enjoyment of our residents and visitors is a positive and I think done correctly as is being outlined here and safely is a good use of our Thank you. I'm going to make it a little bit on the top of the slide. So I'm fully in favor. |
| 01:36:45.81 | Janelle Kilman | So councilman, let me just clarify, On page one of the staff report, the recommended motion is to adopt resolution for improving the proposed parkland outdoor dining program, instruct staff to work with the planning commission, update the SMC, Issue notice to existing permitted parklets need compliance by certain dates like fees, retire, the existing private program and fee waiver, from the prior plan. Would you be in favor of a motion that captured all of those? I don't think that we should |
| 01:37:13.97 | Morgan Pierce | retire the program until we come back and adopt the amendments to the municipal code. because we can't do ministerial permits until we... And that has to be heard by the Planning Commission and by us. So I'd actually amend the motion to extend our COVID program until we adopt. the amendments to the municipal code and so hopefully that will could be by July but I don't know, I mean the Planning Commission will have to draft the amendments. I'm in favor of the resolution. with the four points. of clarification that I think still need minor work. Okay. |
| 01:37:53.58 | Janelle Kilman | Great, thank you. Let's turn it over to Council Member Hoffman. And if there's some of your comments, you could also opine on the resolution, whether you'd be in favor of it. if we can think about also a deadline and some timeframes for the planning commission to work with that would be helpful. Yeah, I'm in favor of the resolution. I think the amendments in favor of that too. I would like to see though the economic analysis, especially you know, I see both sides actually, you know, we want to encourage this or do we want to encourage this to the point where we're losing revenue. And we've been talking a lot this year about revenue and our budget and So the opposite side to look at that is, is this a revenue generating stream? for the city and if you really want to have a parkland then you know then you know, the market drives the use. you know that's that's the way to look at it um that's something i think that we need to discuss in the context of our overall budget and how we use our assets so That's the only caveat that I would like to talk about. before we enact the program what they would be in either phase men or or phasing out depending upon where we're at with our budget talks. So. Thank you. Thank you. |
| 01:39:11.27 | Unknown | Thank you. I would also be supportive of what Council Member Hoffman have suggested with regards to the amendment and the resolution. I still have concerns similar to Council Member Hoffman about fees. Not only the economic impact on both sides of giving up the parking spots or providing for the business and sales tax, and I'd just like to understand what the economic analysis of that is. And I'd also really like to see a more robust involvement in conversations with the business communities about what they feel is fair, what they can afford, and potentially some sort of grant or phasing program for businesses for whom it might be a hardship or who can demonstrate through gross receipts that perhaps they did not perform as expected during a certain fiscal period. And for that reason, they would need a longer runway. And so I would like to have that piece, but otherwise, I think that the parklets have really added a lot to the community. And I've also heard from many neighbors that they enjoy the experience of outdoor dining when we did our community. survey many of the members of the community said they had sat outside and enjoyed the half-star seating and so hopefully we can create a system that will continue that. |
| 01:40:17.49 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you. |
| 01:40:20.14 | Unknown | and |
| 01:40:20.20 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:40:20.57 | Unknown | Sebastian. Yeah, I'm a little affixed about the question that you're asking mayor about supporting the actual resolution because i feel like I'm enthusiastically support Parkland's as you know, uh, on the soapbox advocating for them. I think they're a beautiful use of public space, which I, Scott, who pointed out, could be leased to the restaurant by them paying a fee or leased to someone to park their car. So between those two uses, It's not always open and shut, but the parklet uses a very nice alternative on how to lease public space. for a semi-private use. But I am a little bothered just that this quite impactful set of procedures and outlines and constraints. hasn't had the opportunity to actually be looked at by the owners of the existing parklets. that would fall under them. And I would love for them to have a chance to know about this and to actually read it to maybe see something none of us are seeing that is a real problem or bear, and I'd be more comfortable with having that. having that done. um before proceeding but could be talked out of it if i'm missing something in terms of process. Um, I would... I'll also just highlight that It was a quote, Morgan Pierce highlighted that it wasn't a technical problem that prevented the notion of having a couple temperatized designs. It was actually a presumption But the business owners themselves, as he said, and want the flexibility to have individual branding in their parklet spaces. um, I don't know. No, that's actually kind of a policy choice because you could imagine, particularly in something that intrudes into the public street, I'm really advantaged in having a more unified look and feel rather than encouraging individual branding. And in fact, the, in front of Angelino's that are shared, have a nice kind of unified look. that So I think it at least seems to reason and at least ought to be considered whether we would want a design criteria that encourages more homogeneity, among neighboring apartments rather than distinct. individual branding. And I feel like that's somewhat missing in the, uh, the objective design standards. WOULD BE ameliorated to some degree if we provided even a more fast-track way for restaurants to easily have a parkway. that drew from a few standardized designs that by their nature more homogenous. the So those are a few of my comments. Thank you. |
| 01:43:07.87 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you, Ann. So I think where we're at is, We're in agreement around having a partner program. It sounds like there's some interest or what we share all should have an interest in having more public participation. The working group was looking for direction. Is this the program? Do you like this program? issues with the program i've only heard two specific issues or areas of further discovery for the program the one is the design that kinsman sobieski just mentioned and the other is the sort of the fees in the economic analysis that several of us have mentioned so it feels like perhaps the recommended motion is a little premature but we can collectively give the working group direction that we like this policy with those two elements of, well, sub elements, but specific elements of design and the fee structure. and then take that to the next phase of having a public forum on this using this document as the basis and exploring maybe two questions that designed in the fee structure and then embedded within that is of course a checklist that comes out that is very clear and easy to follow. SO, THE Does that sound like the right direction? No motion, but direction to the working group. Yeah, council member for the law. |
| 01:44:29.87 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 01:44:30.71 | Janelle Kilman | Yeah. |
| 01:44:30.97 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. I think on the public outreach, I think maybe a two part, at which it would be perhaps just public works staff could have a round table with interested business owners. TO TAKE FEEDBACK ON THE you know the really nitty-gritty of how these things are built etc and then but the rest of the public outreach could be done when these amendments need to come back before the planning commission and city council. So, you know, definitely get. let people know what's happening, but I do, I would I think there needs to be a specific forum that's a more technical for business folks to make sure that these specifications are understandable and work for them. Thank you. |
| 01:45:25.46 | Janelle Kilman | SO, WHAT IS THE |
| 01:45:25.94 | Morgan Pierce | you |
| 01:45:26.00 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:45:26.03 | Morgan Pierce | Yeah, I don't know. |
| 01:45:27.97 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. what if this was the forum? I'm trying to think about not creating more work for staff with additional meetings and I agree that we need to have that conversation. What if there was sort of one outreach that, had at its kind of top line item, this idea about the design and the capacity understanding the ministerial checklist. And then perhaps the financial question, the fees question actually comes to the finance committee. because I actually think that question can go both ways. I've spoken to business owners who maybe don't want to share exactly their financials around how much money they were making pre-COVID, post-COVID, both because it's a lift to put that analysis together and perhaps because they have information that they just wanna keep and that's their, their preview. Well, I appreciate that the head of the chamber is here as well as the head of the chamber board I would hope that we would have had maybe more chamber members here to help us inform this conversation. So it feels like we do need that outreach. So it feels like perhaps also that planning commission meeting would be the right place to do it. and then also have some finance discussion on it so that would be what i would Yeah, the vice mayor. |
| 01:46:44.33 | Unknown | The general commerce has let me know that they'd be happy to host a series of meetings or whatever meetings on the parklets and provide consensus if it would be helpful to the working group. So. However, we wanna proceed with that to make sure more businesses are engaged. Sometimes it's difficult, especially for restaurant owners to join city council meetings, given that it's at 7 p.m. when they're, you know, hosting guests. So keeping that in mind. THAT'S A WEEK. |
| 01:47:08.06 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:47:08.53 | Unknown | Bye. |
| 01:47:09.03 | Janelle Kilman | So let's do this, let's ask the chair of the Planning Commission, Did we give direction that was helpful? And given sort of the two primary concerns about, how can we standardize this and then the fees, the format for delivering that, given the work you guys have already done. |
| 01:47:30.31 | Christine Fuller | Thank you Mayor Kellman and City Council members for your your comments and deliberation about this. I think I understand the direction that you want to go, but I would like to get a little bit better idea. about the, format for the public outreach are you in my understanding that the commission hearing where we hear a revised proposed program would be the public outreach and if that's the case that's fine I just want to make sure I'm understanding |
| 01:48:03.81 | Janelle Kilman | I'm hearing actually an alternative being offered, which the chamber is willing to host Um, a caucus. on this topic and review some of them and share with them tonight. |
| 01:48:15.52 | Christine Fuller | um, Okay would that require the working group coordinating with the chamber for for that and would that have to be publicly noticed? if it's just a working group involved in that. I just need a little little bit more direction happy to accommodate however this has to happen. I just want to make sure I'm understanding. |
| 01:48:33.92 | Janelle Kilman | I don't know the public notice, I'll defer to our city attorney on that, Yeah, hands are up. So it sounds like other people have questions. So Vice Mayor Ian and then Casper Hoffman. |
| 01:48:46.40 | Unknown | I was just gonna say, I'm sure that the chamber would welcome the working group participation in that meeting. I don't know if it needs to be noticed, but I know they're enthusiastic about providing feedback. |
| 01:48:56.73 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:48:56.78 | Christine Fuller | Okay. |
| 01:48:56.97 | Janelle Kilman | Okay. Okay. |
| 01:48:58.45 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:48:58.47 | Janelle Kilman | Councillor Zabieski? I mean, |
| 01:49:02.55 | Unknown | And my idea, Chair Feller, was just that there aren't that many restaurants that have parklets THE OTHER if you're copious volunteer time or the staff and directing a staff and maybe they can just make sure that the all the that currently have a parkway just know that this is in the works. that would be a real courtesy to them. could potentially be most impacted because they I thought they were done. but now they have to do something to get into compliance. And that could be a real shock. |
| 01:49:33.30 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 01:49:33.37 | Unknown | someone who's busy and not paying attention and they may even miss the chamber invitation so just a just so that we can say after the fact that we mailed you a letter and left you a voicemail. I don't know. on May 24th. |
| 01:49:46.36 | Christine Fuller | Thank you. I'll work with the interim CDD director. We have a list obviously of all the businesses that do currently have a parklet. or a minor use permit for outdoor donning. So I'll make sure that CDD can help pull that together. |
| 01:50:02.98 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, and Councilor Moore-Hoffman. I think yeah when you talk about public outreach I just wanted to weigh in on this I think for the public outreach part, I THINK YOU WANTED TO As Chair Feller said, I think when it comes back to the planning commission for their review and further I think that would shut the box on a public hearing, right? It's a notice hearing. You have the agenda, people know when to dial in. The chamber I would guess would be whatever outreach they wanna do, whatever, you know, Thank you. you know, they have different avenues of, informing people in their own contact list, right? So I wouldn't expect that the chamber would have what we would think of as a public you know, hearing or notice on it. And so anyway, that's just my, thought on that issue. And then certainly I think businesses need to be notified that we're considering this and that we need their, input either that's through the chamber, just as Ian said, a mailing and hey, we discuss this. on you know may 24th and you might want to look at the video and we're looking at these other things so that's just my on how to move forward and how to do it in a least impactful way to both the planning commission who's already put a tremendous amount of work in on this and our own staff. Thank you. we're trying to be cognizant of how we're tasking them. I will thank you for that councilman Hoffman. the fact that the planning commission would be an actual publicly noticed and help us get that out. So how about this? The middle ground is I think let's give some direction for a planning commission meeting where if Chair Feather, if you don't mind, if you could coordinate closely Julie and Theresa from the chamber. to make sure they have the materials all the time and their membership is aware. There's no questions about the timing when the matter will be heard. Maybe we'll work with them to figure out what time of the evening makes the most sense for the chamber members to meet. And if there's some issue with that, it's not working out, please do let us know. But then that makes sure we have our public hearing and it is noticed and it's Brown Act and everybody's in the loop. |
| 01:52:21.04 | Christine Fuller | Right. I will certainly take care of that. And in regards to the issue of |
| 01:52:22.07 | Janelle Kilman | I would. |
| 01:52:26.99 | Christine Fuller | fees if we could also work with your finance director if she would be available to us. We won't inundate her. We'll try to be organized with what we're asking I think that we need to work closely with her on all the comments received and maybe look at what council member Cleveland Knowles was recommending as sort of phasing in or moratorium to get everybody into compliance or or whatever that looks like, I think I understand the sentiment there and hopefully the finance director can assist us with some recommendations there. |
| 01:53:02.65 | Janelle Kilman | on. |
| 01:53:06.06 | Janelle Kilman | Yeah, thank you, Chair. The finance director is on this call because our next item is measure O. So I will take on the responsibility of circling up with the city manager and the finance director and my fellow finance committee member and see if we can get this on our committee agenda as well. |
| 01:53:23.24 | Christine Fuller | THANK YOU. |
| 01:53:23.61 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 01:53:23.64 | Christine Fuller | Thank you. |
| 01:53:24.13 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, thank you everybody. That was an incredible body of work, very impressive. |
| 01:53:24.47 | Christine Fuller | Thank you, everybody. |
| 01:53:28.65 | Janelle Kilman | Appreciate everybody's time and effort on this. I'm going to go. Okay, city manager, did you want to add or is this the cue to go on to the next? There's no sign of here. |
| 01:53:37.70 | Chris Zapata | Next item here. |
| 01:53:38.80 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, yes, sir. All right, so here we go. Let me just pull up my script here. This is item 5B, discussion direction on measure O, revenue and working group direction. Mr. City Manager, over to you. |
| 01:53:52.48 | Chris Zapata | Thank you, Mayor and members of the public. I'll try to be as quick as I can, but I'll try to be as clear as I can. So first of all, thank you. because this is a critical agenda item And so I wanna ask ourselves, why are we here tonight? What are we doing? And the reason is pretty straightforward. We have a serious budget challenge which significantly impacts our ability to provide services to the community. businesses. keep our employees, retain our employees, and deal with those visiting Saucelito without a budget that is stable, Those will all be challenges. So to frame this, tonight I will again provide information on how we got here. as well as approaches and how we solve this structural issue So we can't deliver public service to maintain our facilities. A little recent history. The council received reports from me in October, October 30th and April 12th. We're outlining the fiscal challenges that we face. We also received a major budget report that did the same. So this is not new information. In addition, two years ago, city staff identified a structural deficit at the beginning of the COVID pandemic, it was $4 million and then some. So when you have these kinds of fiscal challenges, I think you need an understanding of how we got here. and approaches and how we can solve them. So how we got here, obviously there are factors. These include rising pension costs. And we've gone through those They also include death service payments inspired public. uh, purchase of the reason that we have to pay back. And you know, that totals about $48 million in total and will ramp up in the coming years. Our revenue mix has been exacerbated It depends more on sales tax after the road to outsource the fire services committing property tax at 44% in the fire district. We have increased costs for employee and health care and city insurance. Our insurance costs alone will go up $200,000 this year. And as we all know, a global pandemic has certainly impacted our general fund. which in part depends on tourism revenue. So to South Florida's credit, past councils and administrations have adopted fiscal policies that guide our use of city dollars. and savings. I'm not. People import not just a policy. They save money, and they save what I call one-time money. As of last month in the 5% budget stabilization fund, It was $1,580,986. in that account. In the 10% shortfall account, there was $2,206,104 And in the unassigned general fund account, there was $4 million $940,114. And I always like to say, don't go looking for your money. You need to be able to find it quickly. I also want to note that on the Unassigned General Fund, last council meeting, you deduct that by about $200,000 because of the allocation that you made to the Dorothy Gibson House improvements. to provide some affordable housing And. And also past city councils were early adopters of OF 115 TRUST. and Post-Employment Benefit Trust and as of last month, which can only be used for pensions. at $2,561,288. The 115 Trust for other post-employment benefits had 1 million $823,911. And that's great. And that's wonderful. And I thank the council's administration's for doing that because it's certainly coming in Useful at this time. Past councils also and public safety as I noted with the cost, but there was also the facilities that were built which provide benefits to residents, businesses and visitors. I don't know. One thing the councils also did in the past was they put measure on the ballot and they passed it. And that's a wonderful thing, but he has an exploration date on it. We'll talk about that more. And to the state's credit, you know, in terms of pension costs, The Public Employee Pension Reform Act was adopted in Sacramento and that creates a lesser pension burden going forward. due to reduced benefits but it's not a retroactive solution. So that's what has been happening. Going back. What's happening today in terms of current approach to solve structural issues and challenges with their budget. And trying to keep our workforce intact through a pandemic. discounted. is directed and approved the following cost cutting and efficiency measures to do more with less. the cost reduction steps. I'll list them out. You cut the city manager costs. The custody manager staffing. in far as two positions in the police department, We reconsidered the virtual government contract and we built the traditional finance department staff and recreation department. Retend a financial advisor. activated our legal counsel from our social finance authority AND YOU LOOKED AT The analysis by Bartell and the Association on pension costs and potentially a pension bond. as it relates to revenue enhancement. You hired a property manager to manage your property portfolio and collect rents. invest in the business community through an EDAC allocation. adopted COVID relief policies to assist local business. We hired three grant writers to bring outside money to Sausalito. However, these steps, most significant, are not enough to create balance between ongoing revenue and recurring costs this year in the coming years. We identified this on October 30th, but the next three years we'll be looking at deficits, With that, we increase the personnel costs. We should also factor on that day we talked about unfunded maintenance and serious infrastructure needs identified by Director McGowan. These include a variety of things such as basic infrastructure that we need to pay attention to roads, buildings, sidewalks. as well as significant costs for resiliency underground in the disaster preparedness. So all that to say, at the end of all of these conversations, The most imminent threat to Saucinito is the expression of Measure L1-2024. Bye. Measure O goes away, which is a half cent add on to our existing 1% sales tax. That would mean the loss of approximately 1.2 million to 1.5 million per year. over 10 years you're talking 12 to 15 million dollars that you use currently to deal with maintenance and these infrastructure and sitting stars. So I wanna talk about |
| 02:00:27.22 | Unknown | Yeah. |
| 02:00:28.10 | Chris Zapata | what sales taxes are in adjacent cities. And the staff report, I provide this information, but I wanna read it, because I think it's important public in the business community here. from a competitive standpoint where Saucinito is. So the sales tax firm, Sonoma County cities and Marin County cities or as follows. We're in county with total sales tax rate from Corta Madera. is 8.75%. The total sales tax for Fairfax is 8.75%. Workspur is 8.75%. Nevada was 8.25%. San Luis Obispo is 8.5%. San Delfare is 9%. and saw stewards currently at 1.5%. and Sonoma County. is that they've been Uh-huh, one and a half percent. Millsburg is at 9%, Pellumna is at 9.5%. Warner Parks at 9%, Santa Rosa's at 9.25%. So that's supposed to be 9.25%. And those are cities in and around our vicinity We should pay attention to it. |
| 02:01:38.10 | Chris Zapata | So if Measure O expires in 2024, 2025, that would mean that the sales tax rate and soft state would be 8%. And again, as you consider this information, Thank you. I want to talk to you about some experiences I've had with sales techs in other cities. in particular Nashville City and San Orlando. four different measures, including sales tax add-ons, including other types of taxes. And so when I see tax measures and tax I always ask the following questions. When is it expired? PAYS IT. who uses services. who controls it. what kind of purpose is it a general purpose or a specific purpose because if it's a general purpose the threshold is 50 plus one on the voter side if it's a specific purpose it's two-thirds of the voters. How did you gather data to inform your city staff and your city council as to whether or not to proceed what education was provided to the voters without which was done And what is the legal timeframe if a council decides to put a measure on the ballot? So those are all things that we need to talk about. And also understand that other entities can raise sales tax rates too. not just the city. So if in effect you have a constitutional cap, And someone comes in and raises your sales tax this year, next year, the other year. and you could be sure that you mentioned special exemption So I always want to know who around you is doing what in terms of sales tax. and Again, I want to stress that the information I provided on April the 12th about, you know, what the next three years look like, what the next 10 years look like, showed that we were facing increased costs in Sausalito related to some of our bond payments and obviously even pension clients. So it's really important for me to sit down with you all and just talk candidly about We're warned. and what it is that you can do about it. And also to let you know that As we talk about, cost-cutting, revenue enhancement, You always have to have a plan Uh, when things aren't there. particular, if you were to lose a million and a half dollars with $1.2. Uh, measure o in 2025 what are you going to do what are you going to cut but we did a half dollar cost and even cut. Or what other things are you gonna do to look at revenue enhancement? but you need to plan for a scenario where that's not there. And so that's something I'm conditioned to do what we want to do. So on May the 10th, the city attorney gave you a schedule of the timeline for placing members on the ballot for this November. And also, to proceed with the a ballot question the council would have to vote for this before June on or before June 28th, so there's not much time. So what I want to say to you all is I want to just take a moment to Answer questions or public comment. and then I can continue on with my recommendations |
| 02:04:37.75 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you very much, city manager. Questions for the city manager. I'll just let everybody know this finance committee I did hear this on May 12th. And we have a thorough conversation with the finance director, city manager, and the consultants. |
| 02:04:52.43 | Unknown | Yes, Vice Mayor. Thank you, Chris. And thanks for revising or reviewing for the public, the steps we've taken to try to get our budget back on track and be more fiscally responsible this year. I appreciate that. And obviously appreciate your help and Vivian, our finance director's help in making that a reality. Just a couple of questions about the implications of the raising of the tax and how much we might be able to do that. Is the cap at 9% for us? |
| 02:05:20.15 | Chris Zapata | You know, don't quote me on this, but I believe it's 9.75. but I will get that number exactly to you Cities can only raise those 2% is my understanding. from our consultants. So if you went up Um, The total rate shouldn't go down 975 unless you get exemption from Sacramento to go higher. In San Leandro, our sales tax rate was 10 and a quarter And that's because we got special legislation as some other counties did to go beyond the cap. I believe. Typically, these cities don't go beyond 2%, is my experience. on their side. And then the overall tax rate of which 6% comes and goes to the state. portion of that goes to the county. but cities can go up 2% is my understanding. |
| 02:06:06.34 | Unknown | So our highest possible according to your understanding would be to go up to 9.5% at this point. |
| 02:06:11.47 | Chris Zapata | Yep. 775. One... So, |
| 02:06:20.06 | Unknown | Quick math, that was great. um and and then and and do you envision so obviously it's not just general sales taxes for a specific purpose it's the infrastructure it's our roads it's the reason we made the change in allocating money from our general fund to make sure we were promising to our voters who were in favor of measure to provide on that and deliver on that promise do you envision if there were to be an increase i know we're discussing discussing measure O tonight. This would all be related specifically to measure O or would it be an additional opportunity for revenue stream for the city when you think about it? |
| 02:06:52.48 | Chris Zapata | Let me give you my understanding of the measure, Vice Mayor. Measure O is a general purpose tax. It was passed at 50% plus one It was passed. by the voters, it's a general purpose tax that had a focus where there was education about the need for infrastructure and maintenance that was, part of the education but the actual measure It wasn't a specific purpose to infrastructure. And therefore the city has the opportunity to use it for other general fund purposes, which last year's budget did, in which the issue is budget corrected. because every year that it was implemented, It was 1.2, 1.3, 1.4 million. and then some general fund money allocated to infrastructure to the capital improvement program. Last year was the first year we did not do that in the adoption of the budget. As I got here, I thought that was flawed. I talked to a lot of you all. said, you know, our infrastructure is falling apart. and we need to make that investment. So we did make that investment in January out of the general fund reserve to put 1.2 million back. So your perfect record of absolutely using that money for maintenance and infrastructure will be honored. And in that conversation, that $1.2 million was directed by the Council for the Missouri for the purpose of roads Project Administration. PROJECT MANAGEMENT. And so if you're going to have another talk about, you know, something that is different than, measure O, Would it be a general purpose tax or would it be something for a specific purpose, like for public safety, or for pensions. or for things like that. And if that's so, then you have a two thirds threshold. You don't have that right now. |
| 02:08:30.54 | Unknown | Okay, and then just to make it more clear for the public, the direction you're looking for from us tonight is that you'd like to have permission for our consultants to pursue in their community survey what positive language there could be around mid-rail, but would you also like us to... VOTE ON approving moving forward with a sales tax increase potentially or getting it on the ballot. I just want to be very clear about what action you're asking from us to take this evening. |
| 02:08:55.84 | Chris Zapata | So I'm looking for direction for three things and not to put it on the ballot. It's a little premature for that. What I'm looking for is direction to be able to use, to consult a move higher to do a community survey on the satisfaction of residents with with their city manager, with other things that you have talked about as part of the city manager evaluation, which relates to services in the city. to expand that into something that would include a test of Metro voters on what their appetite is for an extension a sales tax measure. So I have the approval right now. to go forward and bring on FM3 to do that. I would like to expand it. And so if you give me direction today to do that, then I think I have the authority to do that. you and then go out and get some information that you can use as a city council that will say to you, you know, a likely voter in Sausalito. would support or would not support measure O at 1%, a percent and a half, whatever. But that data is extremely important for you to have. before you say, you know, you want to put it on the ballot. So I would be looking for that. If there's an appetite to put other things on the ballot, that's another question for another agenda. But right now I'm looking at measure or measure or specifically and trying to figure out if we can get some information and data that would inform decision and put it on the ballot or not. |
| 02:10:24.56 | Unknown | And in terms of demonstrating or understanding the language that you'd like for the consultants to explore with members of the public, do you envision having a council member or a working group collaborate with those consultants or will you be responsible for developing that language? |
| 02:10:41.96 | Chris Zapata | This has got to be a three-way partnership. You have to have council input, staff input, and you need a consultant to help you craft the legal language of going on a ballot measure so that it doesn't get challenged. And it's something that you can present to the county and put it on the ballot question. And so that's a three-part THE PARTNERSHIP. City staff. should have some council people saying, these are the questions that you want on it. whether it's 1%, 2%, 5%, some other iteration. And if you want to have a conversation about other things that could go on a ballot, potentially that person can help you with that as well. but I'd like to do that under my authority. And I think I can. Thank you. I think there's enough budget under the city manager to authorize me to bring on a consultant, you've used them in the past. Most students do and they help you and what it is that's legal and what it is. acceptable, help you develop a public participation plan. And then help you interpret the survey data that says, this is what's likely to happen in a vote. |
| 02:11:46.83 | Unknown | Okay. Thank you. And thanks again for the hard work on bringing this before us and being creative about our structural deficit and steps we can take. Appreciate it. |
| 02:11:55.77 | Janelle Kilman | you Any other questions for the city manager? Okay, we'll have another opportunity. Let's go ahead and see if there's a public comment. Yeah, Councillor Rafferty. |
| 02:12:08.12 | Morgan Pierce | I'm sorry. I just on my timing, I'm just looking back at Mary's memo from our last meeting. And the last meeting that we have to put somebody on the ballot right now looks like July 11th. IS THAT? |
| 02:12:22.98 | Janelle Kilman | in our last meeting. |
| 02:12:23.23 | Morgan Pierce | All right. |
| 02:12:26.25 | Janelle Kilman | July 12th is our last meeting, then July. |
| 02:12:28.76 | Chris Zapata | that serves. |
| 02:12:28.90 | Janelle Kilman | So. August 12th is the deadline. |
| 02:12:31.97 | Morgan Pierce | like but our last meeting that's regularly scheduled is July 12th. So I guess my question if that's correct my question to the city manager is |
| 02:12:32.83 | Chris Zapata | I'm going to be happy. |
| 02:12:33.13 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 02:12:42.23 | Morgan Pierce | do we have sufficient time to get the public opinion survey done. Form the questions, assuming we authorize you tonight, form the questions. get the survey done and have enough time in one of our June meetings. to discuss this and then get it forward on then we have to drop the ballot language that's a whole project Thank you. |
| 02:13:08.93 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:13:09.40 | Morgan Pierce | And then get it in front of the voters on July 12th. |
| 02:13:09.52 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:13:09.58 | Chris Zapata | Bye. |
| 02:13:12.93 | Morgan Pierce | I mean, vote on whatever we want to do that. |
| 02:13:15.47 | Chris Zapata | I'm going to go. if the city attorney wants to talk about the schedule she can do that but i can speak to the ability to hire a consultant and what they can do to get voter opinion I reached out to SM3. They told me they could do it. They know the November schedules. Typically over a week they will make phone calls to likely voters that are on landlines My cell phones. you know, four or five different ways to do it. sometimes multiple languages, but it's something that they do to give you the data you need to see if there is or isn't an appetite to look at this and And my experience with them has been the data is always pretty accurate. It varies, you know, 5% one way or 5% another way. But typically they know, and so if it's a 50%, plus one measure that you're looking at because it's general purpose. And if they tell you it's a 35% support, then you think maybe I don't wanna do that. But if it's something closer to 50 or over 50, maybe you do. But I think to go off into an election without that data would be problematic. Okay. And I think to not talk to the business community before this, is out there and we have a couple of, you know, 45 days in which you do that. I think that's important, but I don't think our Financial situation is a mystery. A structural deficit has been talked about and so I salute it for the last four years. I think I tried to understand why that is I think I understand why that is and I said why it is All you gotta do is watch the April 12th presentation I made to fully understand Why I think we need to go forward on this and do it as quickly as we can. And if the argument is we don't want to do it this year, You know, obviously 2024 is, and certainly there might be other elections. So I'm not telling you do it or not. I'm just asking you to let me do the data collection so that we can in fact get you some information who can use to or not. |
| 02:15:13.84 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you, Chris. Okay. Let's take some public comment. If there is anybody that wants to speak on that, that would be your time. |
| 02:15:23.34 | Janelle Kilman | Serge, I don't see any hands raised. |
| 02:15:25.73 | Vicki Nichols | Madam Mayor, you are correct. |
| 02:15:28.69 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, then we will close public comment. and bring back up to the dais. The city manager is asking us for direction to engage in the community survey. to assess the voter appetite offering extension measure o i am in favor of moving forward with that Council Member Cleaver-Nolls and Council Member Hoffman. Oh, yeah, thank you. |
| 02:15:49.96 | Morgan Pierce | I am definitely in favor of giving the city manager that authority as well. So thank you. I would like to have him explore up to a one cent increase. So right now we have a half cent sales tax. So... not a cent above what we have now, but going up to 9%. And although I'm open to other people's thoughts on that. but up to 9% and to test messaging that would look at a general tax such as we have now but perhaps with a Yeah, I think it was really important that we did have flexibility with Measure O. We did need it directly after COVID. So that was helpful, but you know, I think the focus I think infrastructure is a good, is a good focus. If we do go up to Ascent, though it might be sort of a general focus of half infrastructure and half maybe other general for final purposes. And And I think it would be really important to also understand a few other specific things and whether a special tax It's even. in the cards. So that we can get some testing on that. I think that would be really helpful. I think infrastructure is a good one I doubt that we could get a lot of public support for paying pensions, but open to other people's What? Thank you. And plus we have our, have the trust fund. Those are my thoughts. I'm glad that we're addressing this. And I'm eager to... |
| 02:17:35.03 | Janelle Kilman | THE END OF |
| 02:17:35.21 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:17:35.40 | Paul Walton | like |
| 02:17:39.47 | Morgan Pierce | hear what we learn and have this discussion in June. |
| 02:17:42.96 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you, those were great. |
| 02:17:50.08 | Janelle Kilman | Thanks. Yes, I agree. with moving forward in a way that the city manager described I also agree that let's you know, that we should look at, a full cent increase for sales tax, right? And then getting the input from the public on the tolerance for that, I think is super important on either a half cent or a full cent. and whether or not you know, however you can do the survey, but whether or not we want, |
| 02:18:18.06 | Paul Walton | you know, |
| 02:18:21.43 | Janelle Kilman | to try and do that. on a special, you know, segregated tax. In other words, that it's a tax that can only be used for capital improvements or do we want to have the flexibility we've had in the past with the measure of so I think those are all really important things to get feedback from the community. But I agree with the city manager I think we should move forward. Correct. budget crisis indicates that we need to move forward with this so you know this year you know certainly next year target you know, 2023. of absolute latest 2024. So thank you. Thanks, Chair. |
| 02:19:01.02 | Unknown | had one. Vice Mayor. Yeah, I think it's really, this brought me back to the citizen run budget analysis that was done by members of the public for us when we were making considerations about our budget because Carmel by the sea was included as a comparison community. So I looked at their tax percentage and they're at 9.25%. And they seem to be in a better fiscal position than we are based on their spending in that assessment. And so given that we would be increasing if we go up to the one cent to just 9%, I would definitely encourage that. Cause you can, if we look back on that, we can see the positive. And also since Carmel by the Sea in terms of tourism is similar to Sausalito and visits, we can imagine that the increase in revenues from the sales tax would probably be especially beneficial. I would be interested as well in exploring whether it's better to have a specific tax or a more general and broad like measure O. So if the firm could look into that. Absolutely, but I am definitely really happy to see us taking steps to move forward and improve our budget stance, and I really appreciate your initiative, City Manager Zapata, and the time that you put into this, so absolutely in favor of moving forward. Yeah, excellent. |
| 02:20:15.04 | Janelle Kilman | Councilor Sobiaski, anything to add? |
| 02:20:20.10 | Unknown | I spent time with you at the finance committee. I asked all my questions and had all my comments there. No. |
| 02:20:26.23 | Janelle Kilman | I was very enjoying the meeting as I recall. Okay, well, so excellent comments. I think that's a fantastic list. Chris, I assume you took those down, evaluate the language on special tax, the test messaging for general tax up to one cent increase to 9%. You can welcome, I think, other suggestions about things you think we should test on. but please proceed as directed. It's an excellent opportunity for us and I appreciate your leadership here |
| 02:20:56.01 | Christine Fuller | Thank you. |
| 02:20:58.19 | Janelle Kilman | OK. Well, thank you, everybody. We will then move on to item six, which is communications. This is the time on the agenda. for members of the public to write any public comment for items that are 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 a member of the public, ask clarifying questions, make a brief announcement, refer matters not on the agenda to city staff or direct at the subject the agendize for a future meeting. So we'll go ahead and see if we have any hands raised for items not on the agenda. And I do see one hand raised. |
| 02:21:36.37 | Vicki Nichols | I'm Vicki Nichols, you're muted and I want to share your video. |
| 02:21:45.94 | Carolyn Revell | Mayor Kalman and council members, I thought I had my figures more close at hand, but I'd like to speak about another that's gonna be on the ballot. And that is yes on measure A, which is the improvement for parks, including wildlife in fire vegetation, et cetera, et cetera. Unlike some cities, our city did not take a position on this, but I did reach out to our finance director who was able to supply me rapidly with the figures. I really appreciated that. And I wanted to tell the, the council and the citizens that are on this call that from the initial measure through the last time the county dispersed funds, which was July, I know June 30th, 2021, So, |
| 02:22:31.98 | Julie Vieira | THE CITY. |
| 02:22:33.02 | Unknown | over $410,000 for our parks. So I'm not sure everybody knows the significance of this small portion of that measure. It is not an increase, it's an existing extension |
| 02:22:46.96 | Julie Vieira | So I hope. |
| 02:22:48.02 | Carolyn Revell | that they will read the literature on measure A and consider the benefits of nothing else |
| 02:22:54.03 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. Thank you for that. I see Paul Austin has a sender. |
| 02:23:01.42 | Vicki Nichols | how you're being unmuted and you need to share your video. |
| 02:23:16.24 | Paul Walton | Yes, hello, Sausalito City Council members. My name is Paul Walton. First, I'd like to say thank you for allowing me to be part of this meeting. But I would like to also be thankful to be part of an initiative that we're bringing forward for healthy cannabis, and making sure that it's being regulated in Sausalito. I am one of the members who was able to make sure that we got all the signatures in on time And for that, I'm gonna say thank you. Um. I'm also glad because this is an opportunity for us to bring a wonderful initiative before you guys. One, that could be a, That could be a game changer, not only in Sausalito and Marin County, for the rest of California. I'm excited to be part of this because it has a really good social justice He's with it and a really good social equity piece with it also. That's one main reason why I'm excited Bye. I'm glad to be able to meet with you guys one-on-one to be able to talk more about this situation in the future. I appreciate this time. |
| 02:24:25.66 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you very much, Mr. Austin. I see Jacob has a hand up. |
| 02:24:31.79 | Vicki Nichols | Take up your room. |
| 02:24:32.82 | Janelle Kilman | Yeah. |
| 02:24:33.48 | Vicki Nichols | to share the video. |
| 02:24:38.93 | Jeff Jacob | Hello, City Council. Hello, Madam Mayor. This is Jeff Jacob talking from near the underpass of San Rafael. and What I'm going to talk about is the date July 11th, that's the last day to come up with an initiative to put on the ballot. And we've been working on the waterfront to open up Public access is legally mandated. for almost every marina and business that is on the waterfront, especially at the windship. and yet the public access has been taken away. So the number of signatures that we need to get is between 450 and 550. And we'll be talking about it with the people of Sausalito. And I've been working in San Francisco on affordable housing and I've learned a a little bit more what to do and what not to do as far as signatures. The reason that we're doing this is because the avenues to public access have been blocked and I think that this is not just an issue for anchor outs. This is an issue for everybody who enjoys the water in Sausalito. Thank you. |
| 02:26:06.26 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you, Mr. Jacobs. |
| 02:26:08.85 | Vicki Nichols | Madam Mayor, there are more other hands raised. |
| 02:26:11.33 | Janelle Kilman | Excellent. We'll go ahead and close public comment. And now we will move it over to council member committee reports. Do we have any reports to opine on? I think the vice mayor has a mean to share. |
| 02:26:23.57 | Unknown | Yeah, I just wanted to make sure that members of the community were aware that the city of Sausalito will be recognizing Juneteenth as a public holiday this year and that in honor of Juneteenth the DEI committee here in Sausalito myself and the mayor have been working with Abbott Chambers our librarian and our city manager Chris Zapata to put together a play that will be free for all residents on June 12th in Gabrielson Park and the play tells the story of Brown v. Board of Education. It's a really incredible group of It's very well done, and we're really proud to be hosting them. So you'll be seeing this in Currents, but I just wanted to, again, remind folks about this and encourage everyone who can to attend. |
| 02:27:04.52 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you, Vice Mayor. Anyone else want to share anything? Let me see if there's any, oh yeah, Councilmember Crippin, |
| 02:27:13.92 | Morgan Pierce | Oh, just, you know, we had a really good but long meeting last night and there and I am rest of the committee and are on target to have the final opportunity sites presented to the full council in June. So I think it was a lot of work on behalf of the committee consultant and staff and I just want to thank everyone that made that happen. and all the... and something wrong. |
| 02:27:40.92 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. do I get to say it was a five-hour meeting? We worked very hard. And it was a very productive meeting and I thought the consultant and staff did an excellent job. So very well, Okay, let's go to public comment on the committee reports. |
| 02:28:00.48 | Vicki Nichols | Madam Mayor, there are no hands raised for that item. |
| 02:28:04.06 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, thanks very much. Close public comment. I'll move on to item eight, city manager reports to the council appointments and other council business. So we're going to take public comment on items 8A, 8B, and 8C. Do we have any public comment on those? |
| 02:28:21.07 | Vicki Nichols | the mayor I see no hints raised. |
| 02:28:23.01 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, great. Then we will move it over then to the city manager report. |
| 02:28:30.45 | Chris Zapata | Mayor and Council thank you suffice it to say It's late tonight and you might have more work to do. reports that I would provide verbally are in writing in on the council agenda, sort of public wants to access it. AND JUST updates on our personnel tracking and also on some of the in the last couple of months. Other than that, we will report some of the mayor |
| 02:28:53.47 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, thanks very much. Any questions for city manager on that? in case not seeing any over to item eight, let's see, eight C from the supports commissions and committees. I do think we want to figure out where we're going with that. Maybe I can ask the city manager. I know that you have sent some correspondence out to members of our boards and committees. What is the timeframe for communicating the results of that? |
| 02:29:21.53 | Chris Zapata | Thank you, Mayor, for that question. So as we talked about on that Saturday about how we and start to figure out how we manage our public and council committees, commission boards, you're authorized me to send out a request, which I And finalizing, I found out I had neglected to put three or four committees in which is not good so we're cleaning that up and we'll get that out this week We're expecting a response back from all the board commission and committee chairs that are in that group that doesn't include those that are legal require in the municipal code to respond by the July 1st. |
| 02:29:58.91 | Janelle Kilman | Okay, great. Thank you. I want to take the opportunity to acknowledge that Abbott Chambers, our Director of Communications and librarian has asked that we I gave some thought to the library board of trustees. So we did receive that and it is top of mind. So we'll circle back after we get some responses from the city managers, that correspondence. Any questions for the city manager on that particular issue? Okay, so we'll move over then to future agenda items. Do we have any contrarian items? |
| 02:30:36.05 | Morgan Pierce | I'm not sure. I'm just, I'm a little, I'm looking at our future agenda items and I'm confused about how to adopt our budget. so we haven't gotten an updated budget calendar. We see that we're supposed to get that. in June, our special meeting, I guess it's on the 6th. Or the third? But we have to adapt it by June 20. by the 30th so it would be really helpful to have a calendar and just kind of understand what's happening and on june 14th it says budget varying one hour max I mean, in my experience, that brings The second one before adoption is a huge lift. because then by... June 28th we'd better be ready TO GO. because we don't have any time for amendments at that point. So I'm just wondering I guess I can't, we can't discuss this tonight, but I would love maybe a one-way communication from the city manager, agenda setting, or whoever, finance director about what, and how we're kind of gonna roll this out. because it's, I just, anyway, I'm anxious. |
| 02:31:49.65 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:31:49.66 | Janelle Kilman | and comfort the most. Sharing my anxiety. Yeah, let me take partial responsibility on that. We had had a very full agenda for tonight. One of the items got moved to closed session. |
| 02:31:49.83 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 02:31:50.66 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:31:52.13 | Morgan Pierce | Yeah. Let me. |
| 02:32:02.28 | Janelle Kilman | And so we then had We were deciding between two items and so we couldn't accommodate both this item and the budget item. We were fully cuddings that we needed to have it on. We wanted to have it on. That's why we started talking about having a special meeting on this Friday that we are unable to accommodate through the schedules. So the purpose of the meeting, and that was gonna be my announcement, June 3rd, we're having a special city council meeting at 8 a.m. is to in fact review the material that you have requested and including a revised budget calendar per year request for future agenda items. So that was us thinking we were gonna have more than we had and then it got pushed. So apologies for that, but we, We did pay attention to that request. |
| 02:32:44.20 | Morgan Pierce | Okay, all right, thanks for that update. |
| 02:32:48.73 | Janelle Kilman | City Manager, anything else on that? |
| 02:32:54.41 | Janelle Kilman | Okay. Great, well we do have a very full future agenda list and I will tell you that the vice-chair and I always pull that up and look at that. And I feel like we're doing a pretty good job of bringing future agenda items in. So if you have requests and you feel like we have lost sight of yours, please bring it back. And we will certainly take a look at it. Okay, well then onto a special announcements, which is reports of significance, which I was gonna just say for members of the public. Again, June 3rd, special city council meeting. Top of the line agenda is gonna be budget. We may have one or two other items since we'll be meeting. I believe it'll be at 8am. on Friday, June 3rd, because we are very good in the morning. So why not? Okay. So before we move on to our adjournment, I know, I'm sure everybody saw the news today. I hand over to the vice mayor, but unfortunately some sad news. So maybe Vice President, you want to say something? Yeah. |
| 02:33:55.97 | Unknown | I just want to. |
| 02:33:56.60 | Janelle Kilman | it. |
| 02:33:56.97 | Unknown | perhaps take a moment as a community of silence to acknowledge the issue of gun violence and the loss that we've experienced as a country. Today was just another example. There were 19 children and two adults killed in a school, an elementary school in Texas. And just last week, 10 people were grocery shopping at a store in Buffalo, and they were senselessly killed through gun violence. And in the U.S. we've seen over 200 mass shootings this year alone. And as someone who has been personally impacted by gun violence, I just wanted to share the importance of the issue and just really think about and reflect on what we might do locally i know it often seems that at a national level there is not enough happening and not enough being done, but I wanted us to acknowledge that as a community and perhaps all the council members could just take a moment of silence to reflect before we go to our adjournment. |
| 02:35:07.86 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you, Vice Mayor. Appreciate those words. Okay, anybody else wish to say anything before we move on to the adjournment? Okay, well, I'm gonna switch gears just real briefly here on something. quite happy and both delighted and very upset with this person who is Chris Gallagher, who is retiring after many, many, many years of service. I won't say how many, but I think we probably all have several unique stories to tell about Chris's generosity and her commitment to this community and her passion for Sausalito and the people of Sausalito. I enjoyed many a GPAC meeting with Chris. And I think one of the best things about you, Chris, is that no idea that I brought you was ever too crazy. You always listened patiently, always helped me work through it, and always extremely supportive. And that is a very rare talent that I'm extremely grateful for. So it is, in fact, my great honor to read a proclamation in your honor tonight. But I do want to give my fellow council members an opportunity to say a few words, should they wish, before I read the official proclamation, which we will then sign and laminate for you. Not laminate, sorry. |
| 02:36:28.24 | Chris Gallagher | Eminence. |
| 02:36:31.93 | Unknown | Anyone else wish to chime in here? I was gonna say, Chris, as I said to you on the street, the other day, Every time I do historical research on issues that are before us, your names are all over. the documents . intimately involved in all good things Sausalito for many, many years. I'm only sorry we overlapped so shortly in an official role, but can't thank you enough for everything you've done. to get us to where we are today. And we build on top of all that. contribution. So thank you. |
| 02:37:04.09 | Janelle Kilman | as we're often. Um, Yeah, I mean, everybody's going to hear with a proclamation, but the tremendous amount of support that Chris has given to our community is just, really incredible in the different groups in the different ways in which you have contributed to Sausalito is really quite Quite amazing. from rotary to as you know the director for the Corps of Engineers facility and opening that facility up to us and the community to be you know to enhance all of us in our different efforts and non-profit efforts. It's just So anyway, thank you for all of your your service with the Corps but also your service to the people of Sausalito and you have made a tremendous impact on our town and I thank you for that I know it I know it is a lot of late nights and extra work. And so I appreciate that. |
| 02:37:57.69 | Unknown | you |
| 02:38:01.45 | Janelle Kilman | And, um, Wish you well. So thank you. Bye. |
| 02:38:05.33 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:38:05.87 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 02:38:05.98 | Unknown | Right. |
| 02:38:06.19 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. Thank you. |
| 02:38:06.72 | Unknown | Vice President. I don't really know where to start because I am such a fan of Chris Gallagher. who I was lucky enough to meet for the first time in 2017, when I unsuccessfully ran for city council, and Chris was very skeptical of me, rightfully so. And you know, later I was really lucky to get to know you Chris through both GPAC and Rotary and really call you a friend. And I see how much you're invested in every aspect of our community, whether it's showing up for any event we might have any public meeting, serving on a commission, writing a report. offering your space to anyone willing to give it, showing up at our community bookstore just to support it, sponsoring and supporting the Humane Society. It could go on forever about all of the things that you do for our community. equally mad at you for leaving and I'm excited for your next chapter, but I'm very sad to see you go. I'm going to leave you with a quote from one of your favorite Disney characters will probably be a favorite Snoopy. which is just be yourself. No one can say you're doing it wrong. So we really appreciate you. I'm going to cry if I keep talking about you too much. So I'm just going to stop it. We will certainly, certainly miss you. |
| 02:39:22.32 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 02:39:24.29 | Unknown | Thank you. |
| 02:39:24.31 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. Oh my gosh, yeah, there's just so much to say about Chris. And I just cannot believe how many places you seem to be able to be at one time. Thank you. just you're always at every community event, you know, every everywhere. I go, I just, you know, we're there. And I don't know how you do it, I don't know, you know, you just got such a generosity of spirit. And I such a commitment and loyalty to the organizations that you serve. I also just want to say professionally, you are just a kick-ass professional and leader of your Um, of the Bay Model, having overseen just a giant renovation of that property, kind of looking ahead years ago to put solar panels. on it, the programs that you organize and the passion that you serve the, serve your job is just also unbelievably admirable and you are so good at it. And lastly, I just want to say But... I love it that you just share a passion for the Northeast East Coast summer camps. But my kids have been enjoying and lobster and All things Maine, |
| 02:40:50.51 | Unknown | That's right. Bye. |
| 02:40:51.35 | Morgan Pierce | by association the neighboring New Hampshire. So I love that about you out here far away. that you keep that close to your heart. And anyway, just thank you. There are no words that can be enough. to fill your shoes. So thank you. |
| 02:41:09.03 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 02:41:09.78 | Morgan Pierce | Thank you. |
| 02:41:09.79 | Janelle Kilman | Well said, well said. Chris, I don't know if you remember my very first memory of you and I shouldn't say this, but I guess now we can because you're leaving. It was like 2001 and there was art festival after hours. And a few of us stayed after and maybe enjoyed a drink or two with you. You showed me the ropes of behind the scenes after dark. That was a interesting place to be. But you always managed to have your hand involved with incredible aspects of the community. You made space for Call of the Sea and Sea Track when we called you and said, hey, we want to manufacture plastic shields and masks during COVID. Can we use the Bay Model as a staging ground? He said, yeah, sure, why not? And I know you got a great honor from the Army Corps for your service in support of that effort. You are, I think, was the mother of the VIPs program? Is that what we decided to? |
| 02:42:00.23 | Chris Gallagher | I founded the VIPs, yes. |
| 02:42:01.43 | Janelle Kilman | That's right. Thank you. |
| 02:42:01.97 | Chris Gallagher | Thank you. |
| 02:42:03.31 | Janelle Kilman | And I don't know how many times you've been to Sakata, Japan, but I know that when I said, do you think I could talk to the mayor about climate change? You made that happen. So you are someone who gets it done and I am extremely grateful. So I have a longer list, but anyway, I want to go. So I'm gonna read the proclamation now. So there's a proclamation of Mayor of the city of Saucido recognizing Chris Gallagher upon her retirement. So whereas the city of South Stato recognizes the desire of Chris Gallagher to retire from the Army Corps of Engineers after 30 years of service. And whereas Chris arrived in South Stato in 1986, serving the Army Corps of Engineers as their education coordinator at the Bay Model and moving on to park manager in 2001, And whereas Chris immediately became a member of the South State community by joining the Lernery Club and the Chamber of Commerce and helping out the community wherever she could, And whereas previous city councils have noted how Chris became involved in our city government, serving on several boards and committees, And whereas Chris was deeply involved with so many special events in and around our little town, Whereas Chris even made history in Sausalito of being one of the founding mothers of our volunteers in public safety and serving as the first president of Ips, along with helping with court runs with the police department, security and special events, and filling in where needed. And whereas it is obvious that Chris needs a break from all this work on and off the job. Now, therefore, and in witness thereof, I, Janelle Kilman, mayor of the city of Sausalito, have ear unto set my hand upon this proclamation recognizing and thanking Chris for her many many many years of dedicated community involvement and encourage her to continue helping along the way but after she takes a very well-deserved break Chris, would you like to say a few words on as you |
| 02:43:46.17 | Chris Gallagher | Thank you. |
| 02:43:46.21 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you. |
| 02:43:46.23 | Chris Gallagher | Thank you. Is it less? Yeah, I can say a few words. So just so you know, it's 39 years. So... That's right. So give me a give me credit for those last nine, but um, No, it's been an honor to serve. As you all know, I don't live in Sausalito, but I spend 99% of my life there. And so it's been an honor to serve Sausalito and give back to that community. I guess by not living there, it saved me from But Dean approached to be on the city council. So I don't have I have that. I always have that in my back pocket. I don't live here. So, plus it'd probably be a big conflict with the Corps. But anyway, I have been really privileged with the Corps of Engineers. They've been great supporters of me and allowing me to do the things that I love to do and be in the community. And I think it's really, speaks well of them to allow me to do that and then vice versa. Hopefully people respect the Corps. and the work we do down there. So I'm not going to wait right away. Probably not till next spring. the rest of the year on the call of the C board to finish up and then also on the EDAC committee, which, unless somebody says I have to go off I plan on finishing that term so I will be around and um I probably will go to Maine sometime in the summer, but other than that, you'll at least see me through the end of the year. |
| 02:45:27.68 | Janelle Kilman | Glad to hear that. |
| 02:45:28.57 | Chris Gallagher | So thank you very much. |
| 02:45:30.92 | Janelle Kilman | Thank you, Chris. And with that proclamation, which we will sign and deliver to you, we are adjourned. Thank you everybody. Right, congratulations, Chris. Thanks, Chris. Enjoy. Thanks. |
| 02:45:44.62 | Unknown | Thank you. |
Maria Hernandez — Against: Stated the CDD department is broken and on its fourth director. Argued that reducing hours and pay amid high inflation will worsen already poor customer service to residents. ▶ 📄
Ted (Sewer Coordinator) — Against: Criticized the proposed contract change as a radical restructuring akin to a 5% furlough, failing to account for skyrocketing living costs and the previous 2020 furlough. Called the proposal dispassionate. ▶ 📄
Brian Vitale — Against: Urged investment in staff, not just city property. Said a 5% furlough is disheartening when employees are asked to do more. Highlighted that high turnover costs money and hurts community service. ▶ 📄
Megan Lockett — Against: Noted high turnover and the heavy workload from the 2020 furlough. Argued another 5% furlough would worsen financial impact and hinder customer service to the community. ▶ 📄
Ali — Against: Cited 14 departures in 7 months across nearly all departments, losing institutional knowledge. Urged council to consider the impact of negotiations on retaining valuable employees and friends. ▶ 📄